Optimistic Glow

Long torn by political splits that grew to open warfare and cost 100,000 lives, Colombia last week faced the future with cautious optimism. After two weeks of talks, an eight-man commission, half from the Liberal Party and half from the Conservative, presented to an approving five-man military junta a 22-page document spelling out an agreement designed to give each party an equal share in political power for the next twelve years. The military, in turn, promised that it will step out next year. Next step: a plebiscite to confirm the agreement.

Since the return of onetime Liberal President Alberto Lleras Camargo from a peace-making meeting with Conservative ex-President Laureano Gomez in Sitges, Spain (TIME, Aug. 12), relations between the two parties have been warmly cordial. The agreement drawn up jointly by Lleras Camargo and Gomez, which provides that during the next three four-year administrations, Cabinet posts, Congress seats, state legislatures and town councils will be arbitrarily divided 50-50 between the two parties, was the basis for the document presented to the junta last week.

The junta, although made up of former

Dictator Gustavo Rojas Pinilla's military advisers, seems to welcome the formula that will let it return the country to civilian control. Brigadier General Rafael Navas Pardo, the most militaristic of the junta's generals, has bluntly told all company commanders and military state governors that under no circumstances would the junta continue in office after August 1958, the date set for the inauguration of a civilian President.

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