800 fighters have given up the sword in an ongoing effort to demobilize the right- wing paramilitary in its war against the leftist insurgents in Colombia according to the New York Times. That is, 800 down. 12,200 to go.

Will this mean that the 800 will be drafted into the Colombian army? Well, no. Instead, they will be given job training and find employment. Not a bad idea in theory but Colombia is fighting a war for its survival. Perhaps re-arming them under the auspices of the Colombian government would be asking too much credulity on the part of international observers. Already Human Rights Watch is whining that the disarmament is a sham. Are these guys ever so cynical about the Palestinian terrorists, for example? If so, give me some samples. I'd be happy to eat crow about it.

There's no transparency, and no accountability," said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for Human Rights Watch. "How can we trust this process? Not a single international agency is participating.

Yet would any leftist guerrilla care to give up arms? We already know the answer. Which does not mean I favor paramilitary violence. No one should doubt the horrible abuses the right-wing paramilitaries have committed. They are no better but in one respect: they are cooperating with the government. After all, if the Colombian government took the fight against the leftist guerrillas very seriously in the first place, vigilante groups like the AUC wouldn't have come into existence or, at the very least, they would have had a tether yanking them with the government in charge.

Worst case scenarios? Either the paramilitaries are being deceitful and are deploying their PR skills and Urine is a fool or the Colombian government has a sinister plan up its sleeve (the second option implied by Human Rights Watch).

I will go out on a limb and declare Urine more fool than sinister. I only hope his plan works and the ex-paramilitia men find jobs or God or something, only not to pick up arms again and kill innocent people merely suspected of being guerrillas. We'll have to wait and see. Still, I like the idea of "reforming" the paramilitary fighters into Colombian military fights. Six months boot camp, obey orders, punishment, law and order, and go fight the enemy under legitimate command. Of course, here we really would want transparency because the Colombian government has had ties with the paramilitary and any kind of "reform" would have to be scrupulously monitored.

In the meantime, where is the accountability of FARC and ELN, the two powerful leftist guerrilla groups who started this whole war? I doubt they'll be giving up weapons any time soon. Where is their transparency but in dead bodies at discothèques?