Some 40,000 people took part in a Bogotá march for victims of Colombia's paramilitary and armed forces. Organized by the State Crimes Victims Movement (MOVICE), the march was a direct response to last month's mobilization against the FARC guerillas. The Bogotá march was joined by a three-day cross-country procession, mostly by campesinos, indigenous people and Afro-Colombians from the war-torn departments of Chocó and Cauca, which swelled along the way with marchers from Colombia's central departments of Tolima, Huila and Cundinamarca. The BBC reported that "hundreds of thousands" marched in local mobilizations in cities and towns across the country.

In a disconcerting Feb. 29 clip from Cuba's Prensa Latina, Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez suggests that CIA-backed "anarchists" could be behind recent campus violence and bomb attacks in the country:

The conservative attack on the regional elections slated for November in Venezuela and emerging anarchism caused President Hugo Chavez to call for revolutionary discipline.

Colombia's Constitutional Court has issued a ruling upholding the rights of the San José de Apartadó Peace Community in the northern war-torn Urabá region, ordering the Colombian government to take steps to end the state of impunity in the crimes committed against the community since its formation ten years ago.

The Organization of American States (OAS) approved a resolution March 5 declaring the Colombian military raid into Ecuador a violation of sovereignty. The resolution was approved in Washington after talks in which the United States was the hemisphere's only nation explicitly supporting Colombia. While the measure stopped short of condemning Colombia for the raid, Ecuador's Foreign Minister María Isabel Salvador said: "We consider this agreement a triumph for the concept that every nation's territory cannot be violated whatever the reason. Ecuador is a peaceful country that had been dragged into this unfortunate situation."

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe upped the rhetorical ante against Venezuela March 4, accusing Hugo Chávez of supporting "genocide" and threatening to bring charges against him at The Hague. "Colombia proposes to denounce Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela, in the International Criminal Court for sponsoring and financing genocide," Uribe said. "We are not warmongers, but we are not weak. We cannot allow terrorists who seek refuge in other countries to spill the blood of our countrymen." (Reuters, March 4)

As Venezuela and Ecuador order troops to their borders with Colombia, the Colombian National Police chief Gen. Oscar Naranjo announced that documents recovered from the computer of slain guerilla leader Raul Reyes reveal financial ties between Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and the FARC—including a Feb. 14 message that mentions US$300 million in Venezuelan support for the rebel organization.

Raul Reyes (AKA Luis Edgar Devia), second-in-command of Colombia's FARC guerillas, was killed March 1 in a raid across the border in the Ecuadoran lowland rainforest department of Sucumbios. President Alvaro Uribe called it "the biggest blow so far" against the rebel organization, and said he informed Ecuador's President Rafael Correa by telephone after the pre-dawn raid. Colombian Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said Reyes was killed in an air-strike on a FARC camp 1.8 kilometers in Ecuadoran territory, followed by a ground incursion. Announced Uribe: "The Colombian Air Force proceeded to attack the camp from the Colombian side... Once the camp was bombarded, Colombian forces were ordered in to secure the area and neutralize the enemy." Sixteen other guerillas were killed in the attack near the settlement of Santa Rosa. Colombian intelligence apparently determined the location of the camp by tracking the guerillas' satellite phone signals. (Mercopress, Montevideo, El Comercio, Quito, March 2)

Following approval by both houses of Congress, President Bush Feb. 29 signed a 10-month extension of the Andean Trade Preference Act (ATPA), designed to discourage Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia from producing illegal drugs by allowing the four countries to export most of their goods to the US duty-free. White House spokesman Dana Perino said the ATPA extension will provide time to implement the US-Peru Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and for Congress to approve the US-Colombia FTA. Perino also warned that Bolivia and Ecuador could lose their trade benefits because of actions those governments have taken, "including with respect to the treatment of US investors." (Living in Peru; Reuters, Feb. 29)