ABSTRACT
During 1998, the concatenation of circumstances in Colombia has justified a change in this procedural arrangement. That year was witness to an increase in the amount of attention which Colombian terrorism demanded that raised the subject to a level of importance overshadowing that of any other such activity in the hemisphere. Under these conditions the extent of the LANS coverage of Colombian terrorism has increased to the point where the subject should be divided into sections for comprehension. The Self Defense Patrol (CAP) is perhaps the most important auxiliary which the military has in dealing with Marxist Leninist (ML) terrorists. In 1998 Andres Pastrana Arango of the Conservative Party was elected president of Colombia. After actually obtaining the endorsement of the criminal terrorists of the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC) for his candidacy, he won the run-off election.
