9 November. The Supreme Court of Justice of Colombia authorized the first extradition to the United States of an alleged narco trafficker, Jaime Orlando Lara Nausa. A constitutional reform in 1991 prohibited any kind of extradition. In December 1997, the Congress reintroduced it only for crimes committed after this date. The Supreme Court is presently studying other 17 requests of extradition (this number will certainly increase after the arrests, which followed the Operación Milenio) of citizens of different countries, the majority of them to be judged in the US. On 11 November, the government approved the decision of the Supreme Court and Lara was consigned to DEA agents.

10 November. The Ejercito de Liberación Nacional (ELN) announced via Internet that it reached an agreement with the government in order to start peace talks in a demilitarized area. Pablo Beltran, the number three in the ELN leadership, declared that the "Convención Nacional" might start before the end of this year. Unofficially it is said that the demilitarized area might be located in the municipalities of the provinces of Antioquia, Santander or Bolivar.

17 November. Members of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) attacked 13 villages of 7 different Colombian provinces leaving death and destruction behind them. The most tragic assault took place in Inirida, the capital of Guainía, a region at the border with Brazil. The Minister of Interior, Nestor Martinez, said that the government, knowing in advance that these events were going to take place, was able to contain the damages and to respond by killing at least 60 members of FARC. Despite these events, peace talks between the Colombian government and FARC are continuing. However, FARC seemed not to be ready to accept President Pastrana’s proposal to suspend confrontation during a month for Christmas holidays. In fact, FARC requested as a pre-condition to accept the proposal that the government: - guarantee the return of the 1,5 million displaced persons, - increase of the minimum wage, - refuse any military cooperation with the United States.

21 November. Iñigo Egiluz, a member of the Spanish NGO Pan y Tercer Mundo (PTM) and Jorge Luis Maza, a Colombian priest were found dead in the river Atrato (region of Chocó) after having been disappeared three days before. PTM and the Dioceses of Quibdó denounced that the incident was not casual and that the paramilitary group Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC) was responsible of it. PTM and the Dioceses representatives said that the night of the incident, they alerted the police of Quibdó and provided it with all the data concerning the boat used by AUC to conduct this operation. They also stated that the police only sought Egiluz and Maza for half an hour and that the army told them that they were ready to help if the Dioceses was going to pay the oil of their cars. Despite an investigation has been opened, a great skepticism pervades the members of the Dioceses whose hope now is just that these deaths will provoke a political reaction against the level of impunity and paramilitary violence reigning all over the country. On 24 November, the Colombian police detained in Quibdó 9 paramilitaries who are considered to be the authors of the two crimes. However, the dioceses of Quibdó insisted that the true responsibles continue to be free and it attributed this operation to political pressure and not to a serious intention to clarify the facts.

Historically, El Chocó suffered the violence of being abandoned to itself. Its population (about half a million of persons) has experienced over the years that the worse war comes after the killings as more people suffers because of the closing of schools and hospitals as well as the economic embargo over their products. The region is strategically important having borders with Panama, part of the Caribbean and the Pacific coasts. It is also considered to be the place for a future interoceanic canal. The region is also rich in wood, precious metals and it is a reserve of biodiversity. Moreover, it is a prosperous market for weapons and cocaine. In El Chocó, it is evident that the absence of the State multiplies violence. In the struggle for this territory – historically belonging to the guerrillas groups – the paramilitaries gained the control of the rivers in 1998 (the most important being the Atrato) while the guerrilla members are now in the bushes. According to the registers of the dioceses of Quibdó, AUC killed at least 150 civilians in the area of Medio Atrato. In Bajo Atrato, close the Caribbean Sea, the number increases to 500. About 6,000 peoples have been displaced all over the region. Along the river Jiguamiandó, considered to be a guerrilla area, AUC murdered, between October 1997 and November 1998, more than 60 civilians and burnt 120 houses. Further, in order to stop any form of resistance, those last months, the AUC do not allow the farmers to sell their products. The farmers denounce that all these acts have been committed with the complicity of the State. In a community called Las Mercedes, there is a symbolic graffiti in a school signed by the paramilitaries: "Kill as God forgives".

21November. During an interview in Madrid, the Colombian Ombudsman, José Fernando Castro Caicedo, said that that President Pastrana has good intentions, but that he is badly advised in the field of human rights as there are no institutional human rights policies. He recognized that the attitude of the militaries vis-à-vis human rights has improved and that the army is trained in a culture of respect for human rights. He stated that General Rosso José Serrano, head of the police, or General Fernando Tapias, head of the army, are friends of the peace process and he proposed that they should have the right to participate in the peace talks. He also said that since the beginning of the peace conversations, President Pastrana has been very interested in establishing a dialogue with FARC, but he has not a comprehensive conception of the process as such. In order to achieve peace and social justice, the government must talk with guerrilla groups, the autodefensas and it must also restructure the army.

23 November. The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Bogota publicly deplored the killing of Gerardo Cortes Castanea, director in charge of the Seccional de Fiscalias of Chaquetà (near Florencia) and condemned the kidnapping of other 7 people, three of them working with Cortes. The Office also urged the Colombian government to increase its efforts in order to guarantee protection and security to judges, attorneys, witnesses and others who are part of judicial trials in order to implement the struggle against impunity.

28 November. Though in the past the existence of a drug traffic network between Colombia and Brazil has always been denied, the Brazilian Narco Traffic Parliamentarian Commission gave clear evidence about the introduction of money from the cartel de Cali into Brazil. According to the declarations of a Brazilian member of Congress to Jornal do Brasil the laundry of dirty money of the cartel de Cali in Brazil is approximately of 10 billion of pesetas.

28 November. A reporter and a cameraman of a local Colombian TV were killed in El Playón (northeast of the country) where they were monitoring the election of the new mayor (the previous one was killed together with two of his assistants two months ago). The police of Bucaramanga said that the authorities have not enough information to attribute the crime to either extreme right groups or to the guerrillas operating in the region.