Colombia's tipping point?

Álvaro Uribe assumed the presidency of Colombia on 7 August 2002, riding a wave of general dissatisfaction with the country's increasingly violent conflict. Uribe's ambitious plan to gain control over lawless territories and provide security to all sectors of society based on an expanded military and police presence and the creation of networks of civilian support has been controversial and has faced particularly fierce censure from human-rights organisations. Yet polemics have obscured some underlying facts about the conflict. It is possible to measure what is going on in terms of violent attacks, armed clashes, deaths and injuries. Such metrics, analysed rigorously, show incomplete but nonetheless unmistakable evidence that the Uribe government has had significant success in fighting the guerrillas while reducing civilian deaths.