May (Web-only) 2002

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In mid April, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) forced 11 evangelical Protestant churches in Arauquita, a town near Colombia's border with Venezuela, to suspend public worship services.

According to a report published in the Bogota newspaper El Tiempo, some 2000 Christians are affected by the closures. Many of them are presently meeting in private homes for prayer and Bible study.

Church leaders say commanders of the Tenth Front of the FARC ordered pastors in Arauquita to close their churches because, they allege, evangelical Christians support presidential candidate Alvaro Uribe Velez.

Colombia will hold presidential elections on May 26. At press time, Mr. Uribe was leading the polls, followed by moderate candidate Horacio Serpa. Uribe, a conservative, has said that, if elected, he will escalate military action against the guerrillas.

"There appears to be some confusion of a political nature here," Rev. Juan Carlos Monsalve of the Worldwide Missionary Movement church, told El Tiempo. "The FARC heard rumors that we are supporting Alvaro Uribe, but we are not interested in politics. We would never take up arms to defend ourselves, because we are armed with the Word of God."

Although the churches were closed in mid April, the incident did not come to the attention of local authorities until May 8. That day, Hidalí Carreño Chávez, municipal ombudsman of Arauquita in charge of monitoring human rights violations, received the first complaint regarding FARC pressure on local churches.

Carreño condemned the threats against the evangelicals and categorized the FARC action as a violation of religious freedom.

This is not the first time Marxist guerrillas have shut down churches, says Ricardo Esquivia, director of the Human ...