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Ciro Galindo was born on August 29th, 1952 in Colombia.

Wherever he’s gone, war has found him.

After twenty years of friendship,

I understood Ciro's life sums up Colombia’s history.

As so many Colombians he is a survivor,

who has run away from war for more than sixty years,

and now dreams of living in peace.

In December of 1996, I traveled to photograph Caño Cristales,

the mythical river of red algae in the Serranía La Macarena.

I had traveled through half of the country taking 360º photographs

for the book Panoramic Colombia.

I was twenty years old, and with my camera on my shoulder,

I looked for the most beautiful landscapes

in a land marked by violence.

Since times before I was born,

my country lived a war between the State, diverse communist guerrillas,

and several right-wing paramilitary groups.

During my teenage years,

drug trafficking nurtured this war to such a level,

that it made Colombia one of the most violent countries in the world.

I was nervous of going to Caño Cristales,

as La Macarena was considered a “red zone”, an area at war,

as the Farc guerrillas who had settled there during their foundation in the 1960’s

controlled it.

As I got off the plane,

Ciro, who worked as a ranger in the Sierra de La Macarena National Park, greeted me.

Ciro recommended me his son John,

a 14-year-old young man,

to guide me and help me carry the equipment.

We embarked down the Guayabero River.

We then walked in total solitude to Caño Cristales.

The place was of a surreal, prehistoric beauty.

I took my camera out and started photographing.

We went up a cascade area looking for the best angle for a 360º photograph.

John said the river was swollen

and he crossed it.

The water came down hard.

I prepared the panoramic camera.

I crossed gazes with John,

and I remember he dived in a hole…

and never came out.

He drowned in front of me.

At night, I had to tell Ciro his son had drowned.

Unknowingly, everything that happened that day

sealed a friendship that still continues.

Look Ciro.

Do you recognize?

These are the rapids, right?

- Cachivera. - That's Cachivera?

No, those are the rapids. This is Doña Saturnia’s house right here.

Remember that for these photographs the camera rotated,

so it’s as if the river continued through there.

How deep were those pools?

Don’t you remember the indigenous told us they were nine meters deep?

When he jumped,

he slammed against the wall and broke his neck.

Then he fell to the bottom.

This is John’s funeral, look.

- In these two you are with Anita. - And here too.

The coffin opened

and we had to tie it.

That same week a guerrilla commission arrived to take him.

I ran into the commander, Edgar,

and he said, “I was coming for that kid.”

Was he going to be recruited or executed?

Recruited.

With my camera as a witness

I met Anita, John’s mom;

Elkin, his middle brother;

Esneider, his younger brother.

Death had brought us together for life.

Ciro & Me.

Good morning. I’m looking for the Victim’s Unit. Jean Pierre?

Tell me something about your case, Mr. Ciro.

My case. It’s a bit sad.

Mr. Ciro, come in please.

Thank you.

My son Elkin, he was murdered.

Who killed him Mr. Ciro?

The Centaur Block.

The Centaur Block of the Self-Defense Forces.

The mother fell into depression and died.

My wife died in 2010.

Four of us left La Macarena, Meta.

And currently we are only two.

- So you were displaced? - Yes.

Are you enrolled in the refugee registry, Mr. Ciro?

Yes sir.

Do you know your registry number?

No, I don’t know it.

Children?

One.

Only one. And is he of legal age?

Yes of course.

What is your son’s name?

Esneider Galindo Barreto.

Is it important for you that Esneider studies?

Yes of course. A lot.

Currently he is working in Villavicencio.

Honestly, I’m really confused.

The truth, sometimes I want to do certain things, sometimes not.

Sometimes I think about things, and then I do not want to do them anymore.

Sometimes I don’t want to do anything.

Sometimes I meditate and say to myself,

I want to study, because I’m still 24 years old and I can do it.

But sometimes I say to myself, I have to work and all that, so better not.

It’s hard work, as when I finished high school, it was tough.

Sometimes I say to myself, I’ve finished high school and I’ve done many things

but if I can’t find a good job it’s because studies are really needed.

My name is Johanna Cruz. I am in charge of returns and relocations.

Within the framework of all those rehabilitation measures that were explained to you

there is the effective enjoyment of your rights.

What’s the idea? That you are in the place you feel best.

In this case you say you want to go to Villavicencio.

Do you know to what neighborhood or are you undecided?

Citadel San Antonio.

There’s a project there where they promised to build my house.

That was in 2007 and we are in 2013.

So most important would be to be in Villavicencio.

- To follow up on… - That’s right.

Yes. Once your application is done, I need your signature and fingerprint here.

Good morning.

Good morning. Feet cleansing.

Let’s take a look.

Who are they?

It’s the entire dead family.

Anita, Elkin, and John are here.

Anita was really called Margarita.

She was called Ana Margarita Barreto.

This is Memín.

Here he was angry.

When Elkin was young he looked like Memín,

a character in a comic book.

And he remained that way.

One of Esnedier’s birthdays in La Macarena.

From La Macarena, this one you took.

I never imagined that one day I had to come to Bogotá and live like we are living.

Never, ever did that go through my mind.

I thought I would never abandon La Macarena for anything in the world.

I thought I would die there.

Everyone looked at the river, Caño Cristales.

A river with nine-meter deep pools

you could see the bottom.

Immense and beautiful, so beautiful.

To the sides stones and algae of several colors.

I found a job working in tourism

and began to accompany the people who arrived.

I was very shy with people;

I felt shyness with the people who arrived.

Memín was the one who was constantly on the lookout.

When he saw an airplane he ran to the terminal.

To every person who got off the plane he would ask them, “are you going to Caño Cristales?

If you are going to Cristales, my father will guide you and he’s not pricey...

And he would arrive with a bunch of people.

It was right at the airport, like an apparition,

Ciro and his middle son, Memín,

as I always knew him.

They just appeared and he presented himself,

“Hey, I’m a guide. Do you want me to accompany you?”

That was our first encounter with Ciro, right at the airport.

Memín was like the kid from the Jungle Book,

with that incredible mixture between indigenous and white.

He couldn’t stand his shoes. He was great. He couldn’t stand his shirt.

I’ve stored, deep in memory, the images of Memín running around.

Because he would come and go, he would search, he would go get fish.

He would immediately jump into any lake or pool he found.

He never asked for permission.

He could come out from the water, or from anywhere in the jungle, he was wonderful.

Luis Fernando,

I first met him when he arrived to La Macarena with eleven persons.

Those eleven persons were great for me, as I accompanied them for a long time.

It was a very nice friendship with Ciro, he quickly became like our brother.

As a matter of fact, after a certain trip,

I told Ciro that I wanted to take Memín to Bogotá;

I wanted him to see something different. And I brought him to Bogotá.

We took the kid traveling. At that time he was probably 12 or 13.

When I finished the photos for the book, war in Colombia became so violent and intense,

that it became impossible to visit certain areas of the country.

The people from the city didn’t return to the countryside.

Those from the countryside arrived in the cities displaced by violence.

-Why are you leaving town?

-They are forcing us out.

Many believed Colombia was a failed country

and would break apart in several independent nations.

Since 1996, the Farc guerrillas began an unprecedented military offensive

in its war against the state.

With armies of up to 1500 men,

Farc attacked military bases in remote areas of the country,

fighting battles to death, with no respite, for several days.

Hundreds of policemen and soldiers were killed,

and more than 500 were captured as prisoners.

- There’s a bunch of dead policemen over there. Only a few are left.

Turned into hostages, they were taken deep into the jungle,

where they became war loot to pressure an exchange for imprisoned guerrillas.

The Farc guerrillas also increased the kidnapping of civilians,

demanding money in exchange for their release.

- Do you have water? - No, nothing.

With armed checkpoints, they blocked the country’s main roads,

stopped vehicles and abducted their passengers.

- Until when do you expect to be here on the road? - We'll see how it goes.

“Miraculous fishing”, as this mass kidnapping industry was called,

spread rapidly across the country.

Every Colombian had a price.

- What’s the order? - To stop cars, for now.

Those kidnapped were taken to the mountains or to the jungle,

where they were kept for months or years,

until their families paid the price of their release.

The State seemed incapable against the Farc’s military strength.

-It's tough, so many dead friends.

Living in Colombia was a bit like a Russian roulette; you never knew what could happen.

Promising peace talks, conservative Andrés Pastrana won the presidency in 1998.

In order to carry out these dialogues, he enacted a “demilitarized zone”,

an area in southwestern Colombia, the size of Switzerland

that was demilitarized and handed to the Farc guerrillas.

La Macarena, where Ciro lived, was one of five towns within this area.

Long live the Bolivarian Movement for a new Colombia.

Long live the Revolutinary Armed Forces of Colombia Farc – People’s Army.

As the police plane left, the guerrillas entered the town.

They brought and brought people until the town was full.

In the “demilitarized zone” they ruled.

There was still a mayor, an inspector,

but what they said was done.

When the “demilitarized zone” began, they started bombing and shooting.

But it was the army saying goodbye as the guerrillas entered.

I didn’t understand that.

I asked someone and he told me, “the guerrillas will now enter.”

But I would get the army and the guerrillas confused.

The guerrillas had taken over the port and they were drinking.

Next day at school, everyone said, “Oh, the guerrillas entered, the guerrillas entered.”

The professor told us, “be careful with what you say.”

I asked her, “Why?”

She said, “Hasn’t your father explained?”

My father knew what was going on,

and most kids had been told, but he had not explained it to me.

I thought that when the guerrillas entered,

there would be a change

and things would get better for us.

Nope.

The big business here was cocaine.

On the weekends the town was packed with people.

The whorehouses were full.

Women from other towns arrived by plane from Villavicencio just to work on the weekends.

A lot of money was moved, everyone had money, but the town didn’t progress.

People didn’t want to grow crops any more, they didn’t want to work in agriculture. Just coca.

Life changed for those who worked in commerce or with cocaine,

but not for us, as my father didn’t work with commerce or cocaine.

Life continued, as it was.

They filmed all the attacks where they captured policemen and soldiers.

They would set up a television and a VHS in the main square and everyone watched.

In the bars they would come in and say,

“Excuse me, now you’ll see a video of the Revolutionary Armed Forces.”

Those drinking watched attentively.

I watched them all the time,

I was happy watching them. They showed them constantly.

When you are young many things attract you, like weapons.

Once they did a parade of women, all of them beautiful.

Obviously that attracts young men.

They were well armed, waved hello, and hugged their mate.

So you thought it was a good life.

That’s how they deceive young men, because they cannot trick the elder.

I had a lot of difficulties with them,

especially with Elkin.

They couldn’t stand still for a moment and were always up to something.

But when the guerrillas entered,

I thought they would control themselves, they would fear them.

But I never imagined how things would end.

I studied with several 12-year-olds.

As I studied they started deserting.

I didn’t know where they were going.

The professor didn’t say anything and no one talked about it.

I thought they had moved to another city with their parents or so.

Few of us were left.

Suddenly I saw Elkin being taken

by commander Asdrúbal.

I asked him, “Elkin, what are you doing?” He said, “I’m going with them.”

I said, “What?”

He replied, “yes,

they are taking me with them.”

“But you are so young.”

He said, “yes.”

How old was Elkin?

Calm down, Ciro.

He arrived home and left with a small bag.

He waved good-bye to me.

I was with a friend. He waved good-bye and did this.

But I didn’t understand.

So I went and said to Asdrúbal,

“Do me a favor. Why are you taking that boy?

He won’t be any good for you.”

The guy said to me,

“if you resist us from taking him, then you are our enemy.

He’s coming with us.”

And he took him.

- How old was Memín when they took him? - 13. He was 13.

He said to me, “We’ll turn him into a man there.

Three years of instruction

and he’ll come out made a man.”

During the “demilitarized zone” the Farc guerrillas recruited more than 4,000 children,

many of them under 15 years of age.

Memín, like his mates, was sent to the Isaías Pardo training school,

where he received political and military instruction.

They took a lot of kids, quite a lot.

You could see columns of kids

leaving from La Macarena

and other places of the “demilitarized zone”.

Our neighbors also left to join the guerrillas,

kids with whom we used to play games and soccer.

They all left, many, many friends.

They recruited a lot of people.

But since there were no combats and we did not hear anything about the wounded,

I said, “there’s nothing wrong with that.” I only saw the consequences later.

I thought it was normal for Elkin to join them,

and he would soon come out.

While the ruling class, the media,

and representatives of European and American governments

went to the demilitarized zone to talk about peace,

military confrontation heightened.

Farc guerrillas increased the kidnapping of politicians, military, and civilians.

Used as a negotiation tokens, the hostages were taken to the demilitarized zone

and locked in rudimentary prisons reminiscent of concentration camps from World War II.

Many of them were tied up in chains and placed under custody of the recruited children.

Some of them spent more than ten years kidnapped in the jungle

and couldn’t see their children grow up.

- She told me a beautiful baby had been born.

I haven’t met him yet.

I’ve only known him through this small picture that my wife sent.

If the communist guerrillas got stronger,

the right-wing paramilitary groups didn’t fall behind.

With the pretext of the anti-communist struggle, financed by businessmen, cattle ranchers, and drug lords,

and working in close alliance with some members of the police, the army, and politicians,

on April 19th, 1997, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC),

a terrifying coalition of paramilitary groups scattered around the country, were formalized.

In response to guerrilla attacks, kidnappings, and extortion,

paramilitaries spread terror and massacres of civilians throughout Colombia.

The government also sought to strengthen itself militarily.

With the excuse of combating drug trafficking and creating social investment programs,

it received billions of dollars in US military aide in what was known as Plan Colombia.

That way it consolidated a powerful air force and professionalized its army.

With this background music, peace talks didn’t advance.

Violence proliferated.

At the beginning of the new millennium,

Colombia was going through its worst humanitarian crisis in history.

Good day.

Nice to meet you.

Ciro Galindo,

beneficiary of a house here.

We had a contract with the Chigüiros construction company.

-Oh, yes.

- What do you know of the Chigüiros construction company? Did they retire?

- I don’t know. The truth, not much is known.

I took possession of what is mine, what is written on paper.

- Yes? - Nothing is known. Yes, no.

But Villavicencio’s Housing Department had agreed with an insurer to continue construction.

And they had a year to…

- To finish and deliver them? - To finish and deliver them.

What happened with that? We had to leave to Bogotá.

- And which is your lot? Your lot, because there is no housing.

- That way. - That way? There’s nothing there.

- There’s nothing? - Nothing.

-Damn.

We have to look for it around here.

- What’s the number? 13? - 13.

- We have to look for it. One is over there… 10, 11, 12, 13.

It should be around here in this part.

Ciro, so there’s no house?

No, not even hope.

Maybe I could harvest some guavas here.

I’ve been able to check this database with your ID number

and in fact your subsidy hasn’t been spent.

It’s in a trust fund. It hasn’t been moved.

At this moment, we cannot deliver your house.

But at least, the insurer will soon start construction in that area.

I can guarantee you there will be no relocation of your house, nor will you lose your right.

My wife dreamed of...

living in that house.

After so much suffering,

she couldn’t achieve that.

She fell into depression and finally died.

It’s only the two of us left, with my son.

This is where we are staying. The boys sleep here. I sleep in the back.

Two or three people stay here.

- And here? - We don’t use it.

We have the fridge, but it’s empty. Most of the time we are not here.

This is where I’m staying.

- I could come and cook for you. - You’d have to take it to the site.

I’m staying here with some friends. We have a fan.

We don’t remain much time here, only to sleep.

Here’s the shower and the bathroom.

This is where we live.

- Play. - Which is mine?

-Who’s turn is it?

I’m in.

- How are you Mr. Ciro? - Very good.

- Last time we met you told me you wanted to return.

-Yes, of course.

For this reason, we want to make you an offer.

There is the Victim's Reparation Fund.

This Fund manages property turned in by people

who’ve presented themselves before the Justice and Peace law.

We have a farm called Lusitania.

We would like to offer you a job opportunity looking after this farm.

- I want us to go the farm. So you get to know it.

See if you like it, if you like the job, if you feel comfortable there.

If you don’t feel happy with this alternative, we can look for another.

People who demobilized from illegal armed groups handed in the farm Lusitania.

The Victim’s Unit would hire you for services rendered.

There you’ll have a house that’s in the farm. The farm is 20 minutes from Puerto Gaitán.

You will receive USD $300 a month as salary.

I don’t think it’s that difficult to earn some money,

because I can work, even sweeping the streets.

I don’t remain still.

I don’t like the city. I don’t like it. I feel bad.

I like the countryside. All my life I’ve lived in the countryside.

- What are we going to see? - The house, Mr. Ciro. Look.

- Very good. - Right? Come and I’ll show you around here. It’s big.

I was born in Coyaima, Tolima.

At that time violence was terrible.

Conservatives and liberals were fighting.

My mom told me she was afraid, because our town was liberal,

and it seems the conservatives arrived and wiped out everything liberal.

That was the cause for her leaving that town to Meta.

The commander of that area was called Dumar Aljure.

All the time you heard about war,

and combats, and the most terrible fear.

At that time there was a lot of talk about

Manuel Marulanda and Guadalupe Salcedo.

Dumar Aljure recruited all the youth and I was very afraid.

When they said Dumar Aljure was coming to my area,

I would say, “I won’t go for anything.”

-Ciro, when did Elkin return?

-A year later.

- After a year in the guerrilla. And during that year you didn’t know anything?

-No, nothing. Until he came back.

The kids from school said to me, “Hey, your brother arrived and he’s enormous.

Oh, how he grew! Your brother is over there,

run, run go see him.” I was yearning to see him.

Elkin arrived sick to La Macarena. You could tell he was exhausted, sick.

He was no longer the boy who left.

He arrived different, changed. He really changed. He was not like before.

-How was he different?

First, he was calm. But after he came back from the jungle he was very haughty.

- And violent. - Violent. He changed a lot.

-What did he say?

-That they gave him some tied up people.

- “I felt bad, dad,” he said. He felt regret. “I’m miserable,” he said.

Whoever said they had been in the guerrillas and hadn’t killed people was a liar.

He told us he was in combat, and a helicopter had machine-gunned them very close.

The explosive wave affected him a lot.

He had attacks.

- Those attacks were strong. He lost consciousness.

They would start; he tightened up, became purple.

You had to be on top of him, otherwise…

- He told us it was consequence of a battle

that had been very hard, very hard.

-I think he was jittery.

So what did we do?

With the help of the ombudsman we sent him to a hospital in Villavicencio.

We didn’t hear from him again.

From there on we were disconnected.

According to archive I’ve found,

between February 28 and March 12, 2001,

Memín is admitted to the ER mental ward of the Vilavicencio hospital.

“He was temperamental and was acting strange, he laughed and talked to himself.”

For a month there’s no track of him, until on April 12, 2001.

Memín voluntarily surrenders to Colombia’s Army VII Brigade in Villavicencio.

He defects from Farc.

He surrenders without war equipment.

On April 14, 2001 he testifies to the Prosecutor’s Office.

“I am currently 16 years old.

My profession was guerrilla commander of the 43rd front of the Eastern Bloc.

There they knew me with the alias of “Alberio Córdoba”.

I studied in the Isaías Pardo National School of Guerrillas,

located near the Secretariat, close to San Vicente del Caguán.

“I was a reserve in the attack on Puerto Lleras, more than two years ago,

when the army killed more than 80 guerrillas.

I was under the command of “Alejandro Chuck Norris”, guarding the ramps and gas cylinders.”

I also took part in the attack on Guyabetal, two years ago,

under the command of “Romaña” and “Buendía”.

We had seven casualties and the confrontation was with helicopters.

Kill me!

I turned myself in because my commander mistreated me

and I want to have access to the benefits the national government is offering.

Memín is sent to a children center run by the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare.

He is accused of rebellion, sedition, disturbance, and conspiracy.

He must appear before a court that will decide if he receives legal immunity for the crimes he’s accused of.

However, on April 16 he runs away.

One day he calls me.

I’m at home; he calls, and tells me he’s here in Bogotá.

And I’m like, “What do you mean? What happened?” He says, “I’m near your house.”

I thought it was incredible.

I met him and we went to a cafeteria.

He tells me had escaped from the guerrillas, and tells me a lot of things.

I take Elkin home; he stays at home that night.

But suddenly I’m scared, because he’s been in the guerrillas,

and everything we just talked about is frightening.

Commander John 40 sent me to Villavicencio to do a social cleansing job.

We killed three homeless.

Briefly, I went back and we killed six.

As the paramilitary operated in that area, they blamed them; that was the main mission.

I deserted because I was tired and they wanted me to go into towns and kill people.

We had an office at 67th and 4th, and I would take him there.

I never forget the image of him showing people how they tied the kidnapped.

In those images I began to understand all of Memín’s drama and his problems.

He’s just a kid and who knows what he’s been through.

He just tells this to people in such a natural way.

So I made the decision to find a hotel for him. I prefer he’s there, I feel better.

I didn’t know what to do with him and talking to Ciro was quite difficult.

So I decided to look for the reintegration program of the government.

On May 4, 2001.

Memín is sent to an Emergency Center of the Colombian Family Welfare Institute,

where he is evaluated medically and psychologically.

According to the report, “there is a high degree of resentment

due to the inhumane treatment received in the gang.

He misbehaves and is aggressive with peers and educators.

After his evaluation,

he is sent to a specialized institution for children disengaged from the armed conflict,

to be reeducated.

On December 14, 2001, after eight months in the reintegration program,

the Colombian state recognizes Elkin’s willingness to join civil life.

He obtains judicial immunity.

He is also promised USD $3000 to start a productive venture.

Memín dreams of a chorizo factory.

The municipal ombudsmen said to me, “don’t worry.

Your son is in the demobilized program. He is fine, well.”

I was relieved, I said, “thank god, he’ll be well there, from there he’ll move forward.”

I stopped worrying and told Anita,

“Elkin’s joined the program, he’s well.”

After three years of negotiations between the Farc guerrillas and the government of Colombia

the peace process has failed.

The demilitarized zone has become like Ali Baba’s den,

where Farc keep their hostages chained,

grows coca uncontrollably,

and strengthens its war army.

The peace process ends on February 20, 2002, after Farc hijack the airplane

in which the president of the Senate Peace Commission traveled in

and take him hostage to the demilitarized zone.

For this reason I’ve decided to end the peace process with Farc.

On February 21, the army initiates the recovery of the demilitarized zone.

Oh my god! It was scary,

because now it was a war zone; it was no longer a peace zone.

The airplanes flew overhead, it was terrifying.

When the demilitarized zone ended the army starting bombing all around.

The first ones down were the kids I knew.

The town started smelling badly, so they announced on a megaphone,

'Those who have family in the guerrillas please come by the airstrip

as a number of corpses have arrived. 10, 20, 40…

I walked by and I knew them all;

all of them young, those who were in class with me, just kids.

Three days after the end of the peace process,

Farc kidnaps Ingrid Betancur,

at the time a presidential candidate, on her way to the old demilitarized zone.

War in Colombia intensifies and hopes for peace dilute.

I came here frequently. Maybe I didn’t come for two or three months.

I think it’s this one.

A neighbor helped us locate it. We began to search.

What a surprise it was to find the house built and delivered.

I never thought they would build the house and deliver it in that short time span.

- How many years have you waited for the house? - Seven years.

On March 2002, after a row of indiscipline acts,

Memín escapes from the government shelter in Bogotá.

You never know how disturbed a kid like this could be, and how far he’d go.

But from there on he got lost.

He then left and we lost track of him, we lost contact with him.

On June 22, 2002, after stumbling around the country,

Mermín returns to La Macarena in search of his parents.

The army had no control of the area

and a guerrilla deserter was suspicious to all parts.

-We were traveling when…

- He arrived there. - He arrived.

- To La Macarena? - To our house.

- To La Macarena? - To our house. At around this time of day.

- Oh! When I saw him. “Hey, what are you up to?” “Dad, I’m here because I needed to see you.”

- “I’ve come to take you.' - 'I’m bored without you. '

I want to you to come with me because I haven’t received funding

from the government program to start my venture, as I am a minor.

But if you come, we can start the venture, and we’ll get to work and live well.

Then my dad told me, “Don’t say he’s here, because it is dangerous.”

And the next day he began arranging how to leave.

We were going to have a problem,

because we were going to be declared military objective by them.

-Who would declare you? Why?

- The guerrilla, now that they knew our son was in the government program,

they were not going to show a good face.

We took what was necessary. The rest, the house, was abandoned.

Animals know when you leave.

For example our dogs never went after us, but that day the all came out, in a single line,

all the way to the airport. They started crying when we left.

Between 1985 and 2012 Colombia had more than six million people displaced by war,

making it the second country in the world with more internal refugees.

We arrived at Villa del Sol, Villavicencio.

From there you come out with psychosis,

you think everyone is your enemy.

You want to hide from people and avoid being seen.

Whatever you say you think you are betraying someone; it was horrible.

- Who left that day? - The four of us. Elkin, Esneider, Anita and me.

-Do you remember when you left?

- Yes of course. We left and were sad when we arrived here,

because life here… We lived too badly here.

-You lived badly here?

- Yes of course because we were newcomers and didn’t know anything.

We didn’t know what to do, we were minors,

my dad didn’t have a job, and my mother was older.

I remember some days there was no food. We arrived really badly.

We thought life for us here wouldn’t be that hard.

But when we got here we crashed.

We had all sort of needs here.

We were hopeful on his productive venture.

We were filled with illusions.

It was a project my brother had made of chorizos.

We were looking for a place as supposedly the money would arrive at any moment

and we had to start working.

We had worked in La Macarena doing that so we had experience.

But it never came.

With you, the president elect of Colombia Álvaro Uribe Vélez.

On August 7, 2002, Álvaro Uribe Vélez, a cattle rancher from Antioquia

is sworn in as president of Colombia after a landslide victory in the election.

He spoke of “democratic security”,

tough combat against the communist guerrillas, especially Farc,

and the need of strengthening the State’s presence in all of the country.

During Uribe’s inauguration, Farc attack the presidential palace with rockets.

A full out war has been declared.

On the other hand, Uribe announces a peace process with right-wing paramilitary groups.

Within a few months, Congress passes a new law that seeks to facilitate this process.

From now on, all underage combatants regardless of their side,

are considered “victims of political violence.”

The reintegration program is modified and the Colombian State starts a special plan

to protect child combatants.

This changes the rules of the game for Memín.

When we arrived in Bogotá,

they said to him, “You are a minor, we cannot give you a venture,

you have to remain in the program until the age of 18.”

He had to go to a shelter and they sent us to “Man and Myth”.

There were minors, elders,

women, men, everything in that shelter.

They had demobilized and handed in their weapons.

The Farc guerrillas brought war to the cities and started a series of attacks in Bogotá.

On October 22, 2002, they put a car bomb against the Police Intelligence Services.

On December 13, they put a bomb in a briefcase in the Tequendama building, a traditional Bogotá hotel.

On February 7, 2003,

they put a car bomb in the Nogal Club, the business and sports center of the Bogotá elite.

36 people were killed and more than 200 injured.

Terror had arrived at the nation’s capital.

Uribe’s government reacted with an aggressive policy of informers.

“Reward Mondays” was started, an economic compensation program that rewarded citizens

who helped the public force avoid terrorist acts and dismantle illegal armed organizations.

-Cooperating friend, I hand you our money.

Many combatants demobilized and handed in their weapons under this program.

Somewhere in a park in La Soledad,

we ran into this guy.

When my son saw him he said,

“Look that was my commander, I was under his command,”

and he went and greeted him.

He asked him “You here?” He replied, “Yes, I’m here.”

He said, “What are you doing?” He replied, “I demobilized.”

And Elkin told him, “me too.”

- Country or death! Ever onward to victory!

Two or three days later, around 7PM on TV

was the news of the arrest of commander Pedro,

from the 43rd font, with two women.

Intelligence agencies continue to try to establish

whether the alleged Farc guerrilla who was captured,

Duberney Loaiza alias “Pedro”,

is one of the men responsible of leaving a bomb inside a briefcase

in the Tequendama hotel.

Memín lured by the money offered by the government to informers,

appeared before the police to give information on alias “Pedro”,

his former commander in the guerrilla.

I’m sure that once he recognized him,

and said yes, this is Pedro 43,

and said who knows what other things,

they took him and did that interview.

-Where did you meet him?

-On the 43rd front.

-How long ago did you meet him?

- I first came across him… right after the demilitarized zone started.

- How long has that guy been in the guerrillas?

- At 14 he started working with the guerrilla.

- Hold on a second Ciro, did Elkin present himself voluntarily to say this?

-No, they took him from the shelter.

-How did they take him?

-Some guys came in car,

in an extra large car, a gray car, and asked for him.

He ran down the stairs and left with them.

“You are needed by the colonel”,

they said, and he got in the car and left.

- Why is he here? - Because he saw Pedro on TV.

- I asked him if it was dangerous. He said no.

He said he had to recognize people and they would pay him.

I was afraid.

I didn’t like that at all.

- If I show you some photos of the guerrillas are you able to recognize them?

-Just like this?

-Do you know her, Paloma?

-No.

-Do you know him?

-Neither.

- Yoyo, do you know her? - Yes, I do.

-Who is she?

- I saw her in the Hernando González Acosta training school, but I can't…

- You don’t know her alias, her name? We are talking about Paola.

- Do you know him? - He is Bejuco.

-He is Bejuco.

The photograph put present is the photograph of Javier Paz.

Tell me about Bejuco.

Bejuco, alias Javier Paz, was the main suspect of the recent attacks in Bogotá

and he was considered as one of the masterminds of the bomb at the Nogal Club.

Memín's statements were useful for military intelligence.

All of a sudden they told him he would be independent from now on.

So they gave him some money.

-But he was a minor.

-Yes of course, he was a minor.

He hadn’t turned 18 yet to declare him independent and give him the productive venture.

- Brother, from now on, you are going to work with us, to see if we find the other guerrillas here.

-Yes sir.

We arrived at Villavicencio,

and he stopped working with Police Intelligence

and began working with the Army’s Seventh Brigade.

With the Seventh Brigade, he told me several times.

After working as an informer for the army

in his former zone of operations in the guerrilla,

Memín starts working for the paramilitary group in the area.

A policeman picks him up in a motorcycle and hands him over to the paramilitary.

They took him on February 25th

and on the 26th he called me and told me that he was in San Martín,

with “Javier Chatarro”, his immediate commander,

of the Centaurs Bloc, commanded by Miguel Arroyave.

- The plain paramilitaries. - Yes.

The United Self Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) arrived in the area in 1997,

leaving a bloody path with the Mapiripán massacre.

They fought against the Farc guerrilla

for the control of crops and routes of coca to finance their armies.

Organized under the Centaurs Bloc, by means of massacres and selective assassinations,

they expanded toward the historical territory of the Farc in the southeast of the country.

Memín gave them information about his former comrades in the guerrilla

and the cocaine labs they had in the area.

I advised him, “Look honey, you don’t do that,

you are burning yourself honey, you don’t do that.

Your brother is working, we are working,

even if it’s just for food and rent, we are doing it.

You shouldn’t do that. I begged him, I cried Miguel, my god.

I had this feeling this kid was up to something.

Sometimes I worried. I talked with Ciro,

“Look Ciro, I don’t understand what is going on with Elkin.

I'm scared of Elkin.”

At the end he said, “Oh, why did I get involved in this?

- At the end he said that? Was he afraid?

-Of course, he was afraid.

- He was afraid. “I don’t want to work in that any more, mom.”

He said, “Let’s leave to another country, I want to leave now.”

He came once to Villavicencio.

He told me, “Dad, go and tell that mister

that I do not want to go back to San Martín.”

It was a tough challenge.

I said to him, “OK, let’s go.”

We arrived at San Martín and we met to talk in front of the police station.

Javier Chatarro, that guy, said to me,

“What’s up boss? What do you need?”

I said to him, “I need to talk to you

about my son.'

I told him I was there for them to set him free.

The guy said to me,

“he ran away, he ran away.”

Then he said very clearly,

“it’s easy getting in, but getting out is tough.

Whoever runs away we’ll even kill their eggs.”

Worse, now.

He said, “We wipe out all the family, we put an end to it.”

Even worse, now.

I didn’t dare say anything to him.

Fear… I was afraid.

The guy thought for a while and then said to me,

“OK, the kid is with you,

we will not harass him any more, he’s now with you.”

We went back to Villavicencio.

I told him, “Elkin, we already spoke with that guy,

and the guy told us there was no problem, that you now stayed with us.”

He started laughing.

“That’s a lie, ' he said to me, 'that’s a lie.”

I said, “no, he told us seriously.”

- He told us they were going to kill him. - What did he say?

- He had to present himself somewhere, and probably they were going to kill him,

otherwise they would kill us all.

It was Holy Week.

Anita came out and told him, “Elkin, they were looking for you today.

Two guys in a motorcycle are looking for you.”

They gave him the time of 10:30 – 11:00 am.

That night,

I saw he couldn’t sleep.

He lied down, he leaned against the wall.

The next day arrived.

He said to me, “come with me.”

I left with him and I don’t know why I told him, “I’ll come with you up to this point, Elkin.”

He said, “Come with me so you see who’s taking me.”

I said to him, “No, I won’t go.”

He said, “Why? Oh, my dad’s a coward,” and he left.

The motorcycle was there, waiting for him. I went after him. I could still see him.

The guy gave him a helmet, a vest,

he got on the bike and rode away.

The day went by, he didn’t come back.

I went to the Prosecutor’s Office and the prosecutor told me,

“We picked up a body.”

When I saw the cattle, it was all in a circle, here.

I said, “It’s some cow that just had a calf.”

I went near the fence.

When the cattle opened,

I came this way and saw something like a lump.

I said, “There’s the calf.”

No way. It was the dead man.

He was there, in this part.

- He was here in this part. - He was here in this part.

I was coming down the edge.

It was eight something in the morning.

He was this way, lengthwise.

He had white sneakers.

They were not muddy. Quite strange.

-The one with mud was Abel.

- With so much mud and he was not muddy. The white socks were not muddy either.

What’s incredible is how they brought him here.

- It would be by plane that they brought him and threw him.

When they turned him around, he was full of ants, terrible.

It was then when we realized he was wounded, here in the head.

He didn’t have anything in his body. He didn’t have anything here.

-In an arm, around here, I’m not sure.

At that moment I thought they would take him

and probably I wouldn’t see him again,

but I never thought they would kill him.

They had the order to eliminate him

because he knew too many things, that’s what he told me.

He said, “They told me I knew too many things and they couldn’t let me go.

It’s a tough blow.

Children bury parents. Parents shouldn’t bury children.

That’s what is sad for me.

In 2004, a year after Elkin’s murder,

I met Ciro again and went with him to Villavicencio to put a tombstone in his grave.

I recorded these images as witness, as memory, against war, against oblivion.

We were arranging for the funeral

when a woman arrived and said to us,

“There were two guys in a motorcycle at your house asking for you.

They said they needed you as they had Elkin, and Elkin wanted to talk to you.”

And Elkin had already been buried.

So I went to the People’s Advocate and told them

they were looking for us and they were going to kill us.

The People’s Advocate wrote a letter to Police Intelligence,

and Police Intelligence ordered a commission

to protect us until we were able to leave to Bogotá.

While the country was engulfed in a bloody war,

innocent victims, as Ciro, filled Colombia’s city streets.

We arrived here in Bogotá, looking for support, for help.

And the help we received was, “No, he was the one in the program.

If they killed him, we are sorry, but we have nothing to do with you anymore.

You should go to the Refugee’s Office and register as a displaced person to get some aid,

but we have nothing to do with you anymore.

See what you can do.”

So I went to the shelter.

When we arrived here, we had nothing.

I washed my uniform, and remained in shorts,

I left my shoes upstairs and they stole them.

I had only my shorts left. I couldn’t go out for eight days, as I had nothing to wear.

“There’s the kitchen. You’ll see if you are up to cook.”

I said, “Oh my god, now to start cooking.”

But I knew that if I didn’t cook,

in a few days time they would tell me I had to leave, as there was nothing else they could do.

When I started cooking, there were 120 people.

- And you made three meals a day for 120 people? - Yes, three meals, yes sir.

- Between the three of us, my mom, my dad, and me.

At the beginning we made some horrible soups.

I don’t know why, but people supported us and said to us,

“don’t worry, go on, no problem with us.”

Alvaro Uribe’s government reaches an agreement with the majority of paramilitary groups.

With prison sentences of up to eight years for commanders,

the Justice and Peace Law seeks the demobilization of combatants in exchange for truth and reparation.

-Welcome to civility.

During the following years, thousands of demobilized boys and girls entered the reintegration program.

At the beginning, there were people from the guerrillas.

Farc and ELN guerrillas.

At the end, people arrived from the paramilitary, the AUC,

the Centaurs Bloc, in Meta state.

Some of those who arrived

probably belonged to the same group of people

who killed my son.

I was full of resentment, hatred,

and I had to serve them.

This is where we lived, this is where we slept.

There was a bunk bed here, another one here, and a small one here.

I grew up from the age of 13 to 16 in the shelter.

My dad told the pals to leave me alone.

So everyone said, “he’s a fag. Even his dad takes care of him.”

So I felt bad, and decided to leave the house and not depend on my parents anymore.

This guy called “Mollars” said to me, “Hey, are you looking for work?

Because if you want to I’ll take you to Meta, with the cattle and everything there, we’ll work.

I’ve seen that you like to work.”

And I said, “when?” He said, “now, if you want to.”

After he said that I left immediately, wearing only the clothes I had, I took no bags.

After he disappeared, I despaired and went looking for him everywhere.

I went to the police. The police said, “No, don’t worry, leave him alone,

the kid needs freedom and he wants to go to work.

Why do you worry so much for him, there’s no problem.”

But how could we not worry?

So we got there and he said, “Tonight we have to stay in a hotel.”

First some kids arrived and then another pick-up truck.

Before we got in, “the Russian” said, “And you, what’s up with you?

Do you know where you are going?”

I said, “Yes, of course, I’m going to work.” He said, “No, that’s not going to happen, kid.”

He said to me, “Come here kid, the thing is that you are coming with us to the paramilitary.

Are you from La Macarena? Do you like the guerrilla?”

I said, “No, I just need to do something because I can’t be at home.”

But inside, I knew I couldn’t go back.

There were plenty of people to recruit, most of them minors.

I was one of the elders, being 16.

There were kids aged 14, 15, but they looked older.

I thought of my mom.

Yes, I thought of my mom. It was all I thought.

I thought that now she was alone, without my brothers, she would miss me.

I thought about the time I would be there, or if I could go back.

I thought about all that. I felt regret at that time.

She got depressed, of all the suffering, and got sick.

She got sick, really sick.

We arrived at the training school and some guys came to meet us.

There was no welcome or anything. At 6 pm.

So he said, “Some things we have to say to you: whoever steals, dies.

Whoever dissociates people, also dies. Whoever sticks to things, and this and that.”

Next day at 4 am, to run.

I ran so much that day.

They took us far away. And I thought they would bring us back by car.

I was wrong, we had to go back.

I went to the morgue,

to the Prosecutor’s Office, and filed the complaint.

After twenty days there, I realized they were in dispute with the army;

they were enemies.

I mean, that Bloc had always worked with the army.

But once they informed of a bunch of newly brought youngsters with guns.

The helicopter arrived, killed them, took their weapons,

and presented all those youngsters as dead guerrillas.

The people killed by the Bloc were sold to the 21st Battalion

and they would present them as guerrillas killed in combat.

People killed in discos and around.

The economy was down,

so in the morning they would give us a pasta soup but with no salt, nothing.

Pasta with water, or sometimes they would put some salt.

I used to brush my teeth two or three times a day, but over there, how?

So my teeth swelled. It swelled here, here, and right here it really swelled.

I saw they took some kids with the same problem to San Martin.

I got to San Martin and they said they could not care for me,

that no one could take care of me.

So I told this lad whose name I don’t remember,

“I’m going to Villavicencio because I can’t go back like this,

and if I stay here there could be a problem with the commander for the delay.”

He said, “Well, let’s go to Villavicencio. Call me when you’re done.

Call me when you are done, call me and tell me what happened.”

I saw him turn around the corner,

and immediately I took a taxi to the airport.

I went back home, to the same shelter, to my mom and dad.

Suddenly he showed up.

He showed up thin, skinny, black,

horrible.

Oh, my God, where was he?

I didn’t last long there.

I came back scared

because I thought that guy was after me,

I thought I would run into him in the corner, I thought he was behind me.

A month later,

the doctor ordered that we could not be in Bogotá because the altitude was affecting her.

They had cancelled her oxygen supply.

We had to move to a hot weather area.

The only hot weather area for us was Villavicencio.

A few months later, the last paramilitary groups,

including Esneider’s. Demobilize and hand in their weapons.

Several of the demobilized paramilitaries

tell the truth about their crimes in the Justice and Peace courts.

However, within a few years, several of the commanders are extradited to the US,

their truths uncomfortable to part of the political and leading class in Colombia.

Other members of the paramilitary groups do not reincorporate into civilian life,

but rather regroup in criminal gangs that continue blood and fire

with the trafficking and production of cocaine in the area.

In Villavicencio, Esneider thought things had changed,

that everything was normal and he would be left alone.

But they located him

and started harassing him.

I saw a guy staring at me,

so I stared back at him.

He came, sat next to me and said, “I know you.

You know, no one really gets out.

You will always remain inside, and no matter where you go, you will find trouble.

Do you think the organization will just claim a loss over what you ate over there,

and lose all that was invested in you?

We went back to the Prosecutor’s Office,

we filed a claim

saying they wanted to recruit him again.

They took us out of the neighborhood in a police car.

- Where were you sent? - A hotel.

Then they came here to interview me, the Police Intelligence Corps,

looking for information.

I didn’t accept.

They wanted me to turn over all the people

and they wanted me to go on a recognition ride.

They insisted many times, but I didn’t want to.

A lot of things had happened with my brother,

when he was under protection,

so one learns how the system works.

Anita’s health began to deteriorate.

She thought a lot about Elkin’s murder,

and now once again another threat;

it was tough for her.

She thought not that we were under protection

but were rather prisoners.

She didn’t eat or sleep.

They didn’t do anything for her at the hospital.

They just gave her a pill,

some oxygen,

and that’s it.

She woke up normally,

but I saw her in disarray, completely disengaged.

Immediately she said,

“Call my children', and turned her face like this.

I stuck my arms underneath her. I had no shirt and no shoes.

I ran down the stairs carrying her. We took the first taxi that went by.

I didn’t know if she was dead or alive.

We got there, entered quickly

and they asked us for all this paperwork.

I said we would be back with the paperwork for her to be admitted.

They soon called us, after two minutes, “No, don’t go.”

When I heard that

I knew they were going to tell me what they told me.

She was dead.

I just wanted time to go by, didn’t eat.

Both of us were out of place.

And that’s when we went back to the neighborhood.

Another mistake. We should have left straight to Bogotá.

Yes, right.

We were in the neighborhood, and around 4 am, he went out.

Suddenly, I heard a motorcycle.

The motorcycle went by twice.

The motorbike turned around and came in this way. I lived in the corner.

The guy came in this way, stopped and said, “Here’s this sucker.”

I turned around and looked into his eyes and…

I don’t know how I got up so quickly.

The guy got off the bike.

I ran, got tangled up with the shoelaces and fell.

When I fell,

the guy came with a tremendous knife, took it out, and stabbed me.

I got up and kept on running.

They guy came all the way to the door.

Esneider entered, closed the door and shut it.

The guy came up to there and then went back.

I touched myself, and felt something piercing through here.

It had a point, so I took it out. It was obviously the point of the knife.

I lost a lot of blood. They took me to the hospital.

I told Esneider,

“If you want to live, we need to go to Bogotá,

because here, you will be killed.”

That is how Ciro and Esneider arrived in Bogotá

and we decided to make this film.

Ingrid is coming down. Ingrid.

Between 2008 and 2012

the Colombian Armed Forces achieved their hardest blows in history

in their fight against Farc guerrillas.

Through a meticulous intelligence work

they rescue several of the civilians and military held hostage.

Through bombings they kill their main commanders.

Of the more than 20,000 combatants they had in the year 2000,

Farc see their members reduced to less than 8,000.

On September 4, 2012

the government of President Juan Manuel Santos

initiates peace negotiations with the Farc guerrillas,

trying to put an end to a sixty-year-old war.

At the same time, his government seeks to repair victims of the conflict

and give a chance to people like Ciro,

to heal the wounds of the past and rebuild their lives.

Previously, when my mom died…

it lasted for three years, until a year ago…

I started drinking and started thinking about all of that,

about my brother, about everything.

I wanted to kill myself. I felt down.

Not now. Now I study,

I want to finish my studies, move on, start a family.

I want to become a common person, normal, but with more tranquility.

When I come to San Antonio,

I’m ashamed, I’m embarrassed.

Because a 14 year old problem,

with no solution by so many mayors,

makes you feel embarrassed.

You don’t know what it means…

or you do know what it means for a person to get their house.

Today we deliver 17, next week 35. That’s what we came for today.

Let God bless your houses

and we will proceed to give them to you with affection.

Thank you.

Here it is Mr. Ciro, congratulations.

Thank you.

Thanks a lot, mayor.

How do you feel Mr. Ciro? I see tears in your eyes.

Congratulations!

Thank you. Seven years waiting for the house.

Congratulations to Ciro and all the family.

They finally have their own house.

Open it.

We need to buy lightbulbs.

At the end of 2016, the government of Colombia and the Farc guerrilla

sign a peace agreement to end the war.

I’ve said it everywhere.

All groups have hurt me:

Police, army, guerrilla, paramilitary,

all of them have hurt me.

We need forgiveness as contribution to peace.

We will forgive, but we will not forget.

Welcome back Esneider.

- This has changed a lot. - Really, what’s different?

- Everything. - The landing strip is now paved.

This hasn’t changed.

The coliseum is over here. There was nothing over there.

Ciro Galindo was born on August 29th, 1952 in Colombia.

Wherever he’s gone, war has found him.

After twenty years of friendship,

I understood Ciro‘s life sums up Colombia’s history.

As so many Colombians he is a survivor,

who has run away from war for more than sixty years,

and now dreams of finally living in peace.

In memory of Anita, John, and Elkin.

In memory of all victims of the Colombian war.

Subtitles by Futuro Digital Tec S.A.S. www.futurodigital.com.co