Colombia's brutal internal conflict is defining its presidential election

"My brother was murdered for not paying an extortion payment...in front of his children," Edilma Martinez Flores said at a support centre for displaced people in Bogotá. She fled her home on the outskirts of Cali, in the south-west, after armed criminal groups handed out leaflets ordering residents to leave or face violence. "We had no choice but to leave our things behind. They started placing bombs along the routes people travel." Edilma is far from alone, and experiences like hers are why insecurity is dominating voters' minds in Sunday's key presidential election. Colombia's six decades of conflict between armed groups, the state and cartels has killed hundreds of thousands of people. It isn't new, but illegal armed groups have roughly doubled their membership in the last five years. These include Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) dissident factions, the National Liberation Army (ELN) and the Clan del Golfo, who have expanded their control of rural areas key to drug trafficking and illegal mining. A brutal offensive between the ELN and FARC dissidents near the Venezuela-Colombia border last year displaced tens of thousands of people. The two presidential candidates