Organised crime is biggest security and humanitarian threat to Colombia - U.N.

[Judi Lynn]

4. You didn't bother to read the post, clearly:

While the government holds peace talks with leftist rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in a bid to end 50 years of civil war, the main security threat to the Colombian people comes from organised crime - often perpetrated by ex-paramilitary fighters, according to a U.N. report.

Criminal gangs, composed of former right-wing paramilitaries and common criminals, are bent on maintaining and expanding their stakes in the cocaine trade and in illegal gold and silver mining along Colombia's Pacific coast.

Why did you post in this thread? Your post misses what the excerpt already said. The BACRIMS are simply paramilitaries, in new configurations, with new names. Reorganized, renamed. The paramilitaries are doing exactly the same things they did before they "appeared" to "demobilize," which the human rights groups have all claimed was bogus throughout. Just a sham.

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Neo-Paramilitary Groups Consolidating in Colombia: Report

Written by James Bargent Wednesday, 13 March 2013

The Colombian government has failed to properly assess the threat posed by the rise of two "neo-paramilitary cartels," which now aim to control every level of criminal activity in Colombia, according to a new report by a Bogota think tank.

The Nuevo Arco Iris report "From Caguan to Havana" charts how the remaining factions of demobilized paramilitary groups and dismantled drug cartels have converged around two criminal structures: the Rastrojos and the Urabeños.

According to the report, these two groups manage nationwide criminal networks in everything from international drug trafficking and money laundering to street level gambling and prostitution, and have deeply infiltrated the country's political and economic life. The report claims that the government's response to this expansion has been ineffectual, and betrays a lack of comprehension of the decentralized, "hydra-headed" nature of these new generation criminal groups.

The Rastrojos and the Urabeños were among several criminal organizations that emerged following the demobilization of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) and the fracturing of the Norte Del Valle Cartel. In 2006, there were 33 drug trafficking and neo-paramilitary criminal groups competing across the country, according to the government. By 2012, there were six. The government claims this reduction is proof of their progress against the so-called "criminal bands," or BACRIM ("bandas criminales&quot . However, according to Nuevo Arco Iris, this decreasing number of criminal groups is indication that these networks have consolidated, as smaller groups like the Paisas and the Machos are swallowed up by the Rastrojos and the Urabeños.

Over the last two years, the government has also held up the deaths, arrests and surrenders of high-profile traffickers -- among them Rastrojos and Urabeños leaders -- as proof that it was winning the war against the BACRIM. However, Nuevo Arco Iris dismisses the arrests as no more than media-friendly blows against the groups, which have brought the government no closer to fully dismantling the networks.

More:
http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/colombia-bacrim-paramilitary-cartels-nuevo-arco-iris

Also see Amnesty International, HRW, etc. for more on the subject.