The Colombian government is seeking to resume dialogue with the rebel group the National Liberation Army (ELN) with the help of Cuba, Foreign Minister Alvaro Leyva said Thursday in Havana.
“We aspire to resume dialogue with the ELN in this peaceful country to take the path proposed” by President Gustavo Petro towards “complete peace” in Colombia, Mr Leyva said during a joint press conference with his Cuban counterpart. his, Bruno Rodriguez.
Mr. Rodríguez commented that Cuba recognizes that there is an “opportunity to restart the dialogue” of the two sides and “to move towards peace” and pledged that the island will continue to be “at the service of the parties”.
A delegation from Colombia’s new government traveled to Cuba to assess whether the ELN is willing to resume peace talks, President Petro, who has already made clear his intention to move in that direction, said earlier yesterday. .
Mr Petro told the press that he had authorized the head of the delegation, peace commissioner Danilo Rueda, to have “contacts” with rebel leaders based in Havana since 2018 to restart peace talks, which had been suspended by his predecessor Ivan Duke (2018-2022).
“We will make an assessment, there are many rumors, announcements, statements in favor of the truce, of the possibilities to restore peace, but now we are going to see if they are true,” explained Colombia’s first president who belongs to the left.
After the historic peace agreement with the former rebel organization Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in 2016, talks with the ELN had begun the following year, chaired by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Juan Manuel Santos (2010-2018), initially in Quito , then to Havana.
But they were suspended by his successor, the right-wing Ivan Duque, after the January 2019 bombing of a police academy in Bogotá that killed 22 police officers and cadets, in addition to the attacker.
Colombia’s new president has yet to decide whether the new talks will also be held in Cuba. Chilean President Gabriel Boric assured on Monday that his country will be a guarantor of the negotiation process. Other guarantor countries are Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil and Norway.
Despite a 2016 peace deal that led to the disarmament of most of the former FARC fighters, Colombia is experiencing a resurgence of violence, particularly between its defectors and other armed groups, who clash over control of drug trafficking and illegal mining. .
According to authorities, the ELN, an organization founded by radicalized priests inspired by the revolution in Cuba, has about 2,500 members today, up from about 1,800 when peace negotiations were underway. It is a highly decentralized organization and is present mainly in sectors that are wet by the Pacific and on the border with Venezuela.
The civil war in Colombia has been going on for about six decades.
SOURCE: APE-ME
Source: Capital
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