Killing haunts Colombia's peace plan

MONTERIA, COLOMBIA — Yolanda Izquierdo received death threats, but her pleas for police protection went unanswered.

When she was killed last week, it delivered a devastating blow to Colombia's tortured peace process.

Izquierdo, 44, was gunned down in daylight on the patio of her concrete-block house in the Mi Ranchito barrio in this torrid cattle-country town 300 miles northwest of the capital, Bogota. She was leading a group of 800 displaced families trying to regain possession of land seized a decade ago by right-wing paramilitary groups.

No arrests have been made in her slaying, but human rights advocates think she was targeted by militia leaders to send a message to displaced Colombians to give up their fight for reparations.

"Fighting the paramilitaries is like a burro going up against a tiger," said Miguel Arroyo, a displaced farmer, after hearing of Izquierdo's slaying.

"Other members of her group told her that there had been phone calls, so she went to Bogota and asked the prosecutor's office for protection," said her daughter Dina, 15, interviewed Monday at the family home, where an altar had been set up in Izquierdo's memory. "When the police didn't respond, she told me she had a feeling she wouldn't live much longer."

A mother of five, Izquierdo thought she was playing by the rules of the peace plan advocated by President Alvaro Uribe and supported by the United States.

Uribe sees the plan as a blueprint for ending decades of civil war and bringing justice and reparations to war-crime victims and millions of displaced Colombians.

Under the plan, about 31,000 right-wing paramilitary soldiers have given up their weapons. Dozens of their leaders have surrendered in exchange for the promise of light sentences, as long as they confess to their crimes and give back what they plundered, including millions of acres of land taken from peasants such as Izquierdo and her followers.

The right-wing militias started ostensibly as defensive forces against revolutionary groups, but evolved into shock troops that engaged in massive land grabs, drug trafficking and mafia-style takeovers of government contracts and businesses.

They are thought to be responsible for most of the slayings in the nation's long-running civil war.

Government investigators have fanned out across Colombia to gather evidence, opening 20 offices to handle claims from the displaced and other victims. The government has started broadcasting televised encouragements for victims to come forward.