Hope, Peace and Liberty
Encyclopedia
Colombia
Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...
n political party
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...
. The party was created in 1991, when the guerrillas
Guerrilla warfare
Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare and refers to conflicts in which a small group of combatants including, but not limited to, armed civilians use military tactics, such as ambushes, sabotage, raids, the element of surprise, and extraordinary mobility to harass a larger and...
Popular Liberation Army (Ejército Popular de Liberación or EPL) demobilized. The demobilized members formed a kept the initialism
Acronym and initialism
Acronyms and initialisms are abbreviations formed from the initial components in a phrase or a word. These components may be individual letters or parts of words . There is no universal agreement on the precise definition of the various terms , nor on written usage...
EPL in forming Hope Peace and Liberty. The party was active mostly in Antioquia Department
Antioquia Department
Antioquia is one of the 32 departments of Colombia, located in the central northwestern part of Colombia with a narrow section that borders the Caribbean Sea. Most of its territory is mountainous with some valleys, much of which is part of the Andes mountain range...
and Córdoba Department
Córdoba Department
Córdoba is a Department of the Republic of Colombia located to the north of this country in the Colombian Caribbean Region. Córdoba faces to the north with the Caribbean sea, to the northeast with the Sucre Department, east with the Bolívar Department and south with the Antioquia Department...
. However, some maverick remnants of the guerrilla still operate as so.
While most members of the Popular Liberation Army demobilized and joined Hope, Peace, and Liberty, some members refused to demobilize and formed the Popular Liberation Army - Dissident Line (Ejército Popular de Liberación - Línea Disidente). This violent splinter group has killed Hope, Peace, and Liberty members, whom they consider traitors to the revolutionary cause. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army is a Marxist–Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization based in Colombia which is involved in the ongoing Colombian armed conflict, currently involved in drug dealing and crimes against the civilians..FARC-EP is a peasant army which...
(FARC) and the National Liberation Army
National Liberation Army (Colombia)
National Liberation Army is a revolutionary, avowed Marxist guerrilla group that has been operating in several regions of Colombia since 1964....
(ELN) likewise consider Hope, Peace, and Liberty to be enemies of their revolutions; according to a report by Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
, "the FARC and its urban militias were believed responsible for 204 murders of Esperanza members and amnestied EPL guerrillas from 1991 to 1995."