What the commentators said

With this peace deal, “Latin America’s bloody epoch of insurrection appears to be at an end”, said Jim Wyss in the Miami Herald. For the first time since Fidel Castro “slipped ashore” in Cuba in 1956, the entire region has “embraced ballots over bullets”. But try telling the people in Colombia’s rural hinterland that peace is imminent, said Elizabeth Dickinson in Foreign Policy. Colombia’s civil war involves “a multitude of actors”, and the withdrawal of Farc could mean the fighting only becomes “sharper and more entrenched”. Right-wing paramilitary groups pose a particular problem. Officially, all were disbanded in 2003 in another peace deal that promised freedom from prosecution. Yet in practice, many of the former fighters are still heavily engaged in illicit mining or drug trafficking, and they will certainly be eager to seize the 70% stake of the cocaine trade now controlled by Farc. They will encounter plenty of competition, said Jon Lee Anderson in The New Yorker. Still in the field is Farc’s smaller but “more ideologically hardened” left-wing rival, the National Liberation Army (ELN). As Farc pulls out, expect some dangerous turf wars in “Colombia’s lawless backwoods”.

Not that even peace with Farc can be guaranteed, said John Paul Rathbone in the Financial Times. President Santos, a “little trusted” member of Bogotá’s ruling elite, is struggling to sell the deal ahead of the referendum. Polls suggest that only a third of Colombians are now in favour, with a third against and a third still undecided. It’s not just the amnesty that enrages the public, said Nick Miroff in The Washington Post. Farc has also been guaranteed ten seats in parliament: Colombians who know Farc leaders only “from grainy ‘wanted posters’ and jungle videos will have trouble accepting them as respectable lawmakers”. In addition, former guerrillas will receive a monthly payment from the government, and a lump sum to start their own businesses. It’s a deal so sweet that Colombian voters probably “won’t stomach it”.