Pedro Antonio Marin; Colombian leftist rebel built and led the FARC army
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Chris Kraul in Bogota profiles Pedro Antonio Marin, the hard-bitten Colombian peasant who oversaw South America’s largest rebel group’s rise to power as well as its recent disintegration. He has died at age 77.
‘Under the twin banners of land reform and social justice, Marin went by the aliases Manuel Marulanda and ‘Sureshot.’ He built the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as the FARC, into a force that a few years ago numbered nearly 20,000. The FARC at that time seemed on the verge of assaulting the capital.’ ‘But strategic decisions that Marin made in the 1980s to finance the FARC through drug trafficking, kidnapping and terror reduced the popular support on which the leftist rebel group’s success depends.’
-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City