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Colombia rebel foes make war in online video game

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CIOL Bureau
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Phil Stewart

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BOGOTA: Colombia's outlawed paramilitary gunmen are offering Web surfers a

bloody online video game in which they can join the country's drug-fueled

guerrilla war and shoot leftist rebels.

At www.accubec.org/shooting.html, cyber-gamers join paramilitary ranks

virtually, defend a fictional small town, and kill leftist rebels in a conflict

that has claimed 40,000 real lives in the past decade.

"The humble population of Aguas Blancas is being attacked by FARC and

ELN bandits," the Internet site reads, referring to Colombia's two leftist

rebel groups. "Your mission is to stop the police headquarters from being

destroyed by killing as many of these heartless delinquents as possible."

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Paramilitary fighters are classified as terrorists by the United States and

are accused of committing some of Colombia's worst atrocities in their fight

against guerrillas -- allegedly once using chain saws to hack up suspected rebel

sympathizers.

In the game, players guide the sights of an assault rifle over the bodies of

guerrilla fighters. The rebels duck out from doorways and rooftops to return

fire while lobbing gas-cylinder bombs at the mayor's office. Blood spurts from

the necks and chests of shot rebels, who fall to the ground and disappear.

To advance levels, virtual far-right gunmen need to pick up first-aid boxes

and "paramilitary shields" -- which absorb 75 percent of the impact of

incoming rounds.

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The game ends when a player has been pierced by too many rebel bullets. The

site tells you how many guerrillas you have killed and thanks you "for

supporting a free Colombia."

Farc Man and Elena



The 10,000-member paramilitaries -- born as self-defense militias financed by
cattle ranchers -- are Colombia's fastest growing insurgent force and are

accused by rights groups of having deep ties to the military and drug

trafficking.

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The video game is not the only anti-rebel propaganda on the site of the Elmer

Cardenas block of paramilitary forces, who are fighting rebels for control of a

key drug and arms trafficking region near the Panama border.

In cartoon-like animation, the block also mocks the rebels in a story called

"FARC Man and Elena," fictional "heroes" who terrorize

common Colombians. The man personifying the FARC, Spanish initials for the

17,000-member Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, has a potbelly, a rifle

for a nose, and the trademark sweat towel of rebel boss Manuel Marulanda.

Elena, FARC Man's girlfriend, is the personification of the smaller,

5,000-member National Liberation Army, or ELN. She has a skull for a head,

bobbed with blond hair, and is wearing a tiny dress barely covering her

backside. "A new hero arises ... dedicating his whole life to destroying

electricity towers, blowing up oil pipelines to save the environment, and

kidnapping people for pennies," the story says.

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"Welcome to the adventures of FARC Man and Elena. Coming soon: They will

steel your heart. They will steel your hope. They will extort money from your

family." Salsa music pipes in, as FARC Man and Elena bomb a small town into

darkness. "How they like to make us use our dynamite," Elena cackles,

her skull bouncing side-to-side.

The Internet site is the latest in a marketing campaign by militias, banded

together under the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC.

AUC chief and ex-army scout Carlos Castano has launched a new best-selling

biography called "My Confession." The book, now being exported to the

United States, Mexico and Venezuela, explains Castano's hatred of the guerrillas

-- fostered by the rebel kidnapping and killing of his father.

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