Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

FARABUNDO MARTÍ NATIONAL LIBERATION FRONT • 173in Morazán Province and other areas in eastern El Salvador but hadvery little involvement in political front organizations in the cities,having preferred a rural military strategy over political negotiations.Its leader, Joaquín Villalobos, was a brilliant and ruthless tactician.The ERP followed a policy of kidnapping and murdering localmayors and other functionaries of the Salvadoran government andhas committed numerous atrocities against peasants suspected ofcollaboration with the government. As in the case of the FPL, instancesof intramural terror have occurred in the ERP. The murderof ERP member Roque Dalton, a Salvadoran intellectual and worldrenownedpoet, at the hands of comrades within the ERP for an allegedideological offense created much scandal within the Salvadoranleft and among their sympathizers abroad. The excessive brutalityand ideological rigidity of the ERP under Villalobos’s leadership ledmany observers to dub him the “Pol Pot of Central America.”While most of the ERP’s terrorism has been both repressive andrevolutionary, directed internally at domestic targets, it has alsostruck at some international targets. On 4 February 1980 ERP gunmenattacked the Guatemalan embassy with automatic weapons fire.On 25 March 1980 the ERP bombed the International Telephone andTelegraph office in San Salvador. On 16 September 1980 the ERPfired five Chinese antitank rockets at the U.S. embassy, causing damagebut no injuries.3. Fuerzas Armadas de la Resistencia Nacional (FARN, ArmedForces of National Resistance) was formed in 1975 partly in reactionto the ERP’s excessive use of terrorism and brute force. By contrast,FARN concentrated not only on guerrilla operations with its 1,000guerrillas but also on infiltrating and influencing the legal labor,student, and human rights organizations active within Salvadoransociety. Virtually no major terrorist incidents have been attributed tothis group. In addition to eschewing purely terrorist actions, FARNdiffered from other members of the FMLN in stressing Salvadoran nationalismrather than Marxism in its political platform and program.4. Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores Centroamericanos(PRTC, Revolutionary Party of Central American Workers) actuallybegan in Costa Rica in 1976 as a regional movement but wasmost active in El Salvador. Its armed wing was known as the ArmedForces of Revolutionary Popular Liberation, numbering some 500combatants.