Ex-guerrillas in Colombia fear for their future under new hardline president

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‘Total peace’ plan of previous government led only 99 of Colombia’s 30,000 armed combatants to disarm, but new president Abelardo De la Espriella opposes peace agreements

In mid-June, 99 guerrilla fighters were flown by helicopter to a small settlement in a rural area of southern Colombia where they lined up and, one by one, handed their weapons to government officials: rifles, pistols, machine guns and grenade launchers.

They also stripped off their heavy tactical vests, field packs and camouflage uniforms, which were each piled into a bonfire to mark the beginning of a new life away from an armed conflict that has claimed nearly half a million lives in the last six decades.

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