velasco63_Eitan Abramovich_Getty Images_Latin America war Eitan Abramovich/ Getty Images

One Hundred Years of Tranquility?

Last week, Colombia’s civil war – the sole remaining armed conflict in Latin America – formally came to an end. With any luck, the era of the mountain guerrilla, the irate demagogue in green fatigues, or the frightful general in dark glasses is over in the Americas.

SANTIAGO – Gabriel García Márquez’s great novel One Hundred Years of Solitude starts with a colonel who “started 32 civil wars and lost them all” facing the firing squad. The site of the event is the fictional town of Macondo, but few readers are fooled: the novel is about García Márquez’s native Colombia.

Last week, Colombia’s civil war – the sole remaining armed conflict in Latin America – formally came to an end. It lasted more than 50 years, cost a quarter-million lives, and displaced six million people. It seems hard to believe, but peace is finally here.

Pessimists will point out that much remains to be worked out, fighters have yet to hand in their weapons, and the final peace agreement has not been signed. Still, the handshake in Havana between President Juan Manuel Santos and guerrilla leader Rodrigo Londoño Echeverri (known by the nom de guerre Timochenko) marks the end of a tragic era and the beginning of a far more promising one.

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