Unlike past peace processes, Petro's ambitious Total Peace sought to finally bring the country's decades-long armed conflict to an end, ensuring that guerrillas would not be persecuted once demobilized and disarmed. That talks with the ELN have now been called off doesn't discredit the plan, as there has been success in talks with other groups.
Total Peace was always a failure waiting to happen, as armedthere groupswere had no incentives not to continuestop expandingarmed theirgroups territorialcontinuing controlto —expand andtheir theseterritorial latest developments have proven exactly thatcontrol. It's certain that Bogotá did sign cease-fires with some guerrilla groups, but the truth is that violence has rather risen under Petro.
There's a 10% chance that Colombia will experience a civil war before 2036, according to the Metaculus prediction community.
© 2025 Improve the News Foundation.
All rights reserved.
Version 6.18.0