Robert Munks, senior analyst for Americas global risk insight at Verisk Maplecroft: “On a positive note, the current six-month cease-fire is unprecedented, and a fourth cycle of U.N.-backed talks is ending in Caracas with crucial progress for the 81-delegate National Participation Committee. So on paper at least, a peace settlement with the ELN appears closer than ever before. But internally, the ELN has often struggled to balance its original political aims—embodied mainly in its older generation—with its lucrative involvement in criminality, such as drug trafficking and illegal mining, often favored by younger cadres operating at some distance from the leadership. The cease-fire remains highly fragile, as shown by the ELN’s 2019 bombing of a Bogotá police academy, which ended talks at the time. A similar high-casualty attack or the killing of a top political figure would sound another death knell for talks—Attorney General Francisco Barbosa recently claimed to have been the subject of an assassination plot, but this was denied by ELN leader Antonio García. Contrarily, the ELN maintains that…”