Peace marks fresh start for militant mothers in Colombia

San JoS de oriente: Josleidy Ramirez, a FARC guerilla, never had a chance to raise the son she gave birth to 15 years ago in the middle of Colombia’s civil war.

Now, with peace on the horizon, she is four months pregnant and looking forward to the chance to finally be a mum.

A baby boom has swept the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, as the leftist rebel group has embarked on a historic peace process with the government.

Dozens of babies have been born to guerilla parents since peace talks opened in 2012.

At the camps where the rebels are currently disarming under a peace deal signed in November, guerillas in combat fatigues can be seen bouncing young children on their laps.

Others, like Ramirez, are expecting to give birth in the camps.

At 32, Ramirez has spent more than half her life fighting the conflict that has torn Colombia for more than half a century and killed 260,000 people.

She sees the peace deal as a new beginning – though she is also apprehensive.

“I’m worried about ( my baby’s) future. Sometimes I wonder if the Colombian government will really keep its promises,” she said at a camp near San Jose de Oriente, in the northeast, where 200 guerillas are preparing to transition to civilian life.

Ramirez joined the FARC at 15 years old – the same age her son is now.

The boy’s father, a fellow rebel, was killed in combat. Today, Ramirez refuses to give her son’s name, for fear he could be targeted for revenge attacks.

Last year, just before Colombia’s Congress ratified the peace deal, Ramirez got pregnant again with her current partner, also a FARC rebel.

“I wasn’t exactly planning it. I had been thinking of going back to school. But anyway, now I’ll just have to do both things at once: study and be a mum too,” said Ramirez, whose gossamer skin and flowing hair belie her vocation as a leftist guerilla.

The FARC requires its female members – about 40% of its 7,000 fighters – to use birth control.

The thought of getting pregnant, she said, “was scary because our children were military targets. Or the army would use them to collect intelligence and strike us”.

Nevertheless, she got pregnant at age 17.

With her commanders’ permission, she went into hiding in a small village along with her mother, stayed with the baby for about three months, then returned to combat.

“I wasn’t going to betray my organisation,” she said.

No one ever asked her to have an abortion, she said. Some rebels say otherwise, though.

Colombian authorities say a doctor named Hector Albeidis Arboleda Buitrago performed hundreds of forced abortions on rebel fighters.

He was arrested in Spain in 2015 and extradited to Colombia earlier this month.

Ramirez calls the allegations “farright propaganda.” — AFP