August 8, 2007: FARC is taking a beating from its leftist allies around the world because of how FARC is using landmines to defend its bases, and kidnapped politicians as bargaining chips, in an attempt to get senior FARC leaders out of jail. But the government is also under pressure to do whatever FARC asks in order to get hostages freed. So the government has offered FARC what it wants most, about a thousand square kilometers of southern jungle, free of any government control, but only if some hostages were freed first. FARC wants the zone first, before negotiations even begin.

In the south, police have caught FARC forcibly recruiting local teenagers. The kids are taken to rebel camps and intimidated into becoming FARC gunmen, or being killed. Most go along, although the kids are kept away from their home areas, lest they be tempted to desert. Parents are after the government to get their kids back, which is another reason the government is against giving FARC a "liberated zone." This zone would be use to stash kidnapping victims and conscripted teenagers.

The navy captured yet another fiberglass submarine, this one 65 feet long and capable of carrying about ten tons of cocaine to ships off-shore. Like most of the dozen or so subs captured over the last decade, this one was grabbed while ashore.