2023-12-12 00:05:22
– An ex-guerilla designated to lead negotiations with the ELN
Begun almost a year ago, peace negotiations between the Colombian government and the ELN began a fifth cycle on Monday in Mexico.
Published today at 1:05 a.m.
Otty Patiño, in Bogota on October 10, 2023.
AFP
The Colombian government has appointed a new representative to lead ongoing peace negotiations with the ELN (National Liberation Army) guerrillas, we learned from an official source on Monday.
Vera Grabe campaigned in the 1980s within the far-left M-19 movement, to which the current left-wing president Gustavo Petro, elected in the summer of 2022, also belonged. She replaces Otty Patiño, himself a former member of M-19, appointed at the end of November “High Commissioner for Peace” by President Petro, replacing Danilo Rueda.
ELN “error”
Danilo Rueda, who oversaw the launch of peace talks with most of the armed groups operating in Colombia – one of Gustavo Petro’s main campaign promises – was fired with a simple presidential tweet.
Started almost a year ago, peace negotiations with the ELN, currently the most powerful and oldest guerrilla operating in Colombia, began a fifth cycle on Monday in Mexico. These talks are nevertheless going through a severe crisis following the kidnapping at the beginning of November by the ELN, for a dozen days, of the father of the Colombian international footballer from Liverpool Luis Diaz.
The guerrillas pleaded “error”, but the incident highlighted the ELN’s persistence in the practice of kidnappings for ransom to finance its activities. The kidnapping jeopardized the peace process, as well as the six-month bilateral ceasefire in force since August 3. President Petro considered that this kidnapping broke the “trust” between the parties.
“Total peace”
Negotiator Otty Patiño demanded an end to these kidnappings, while the leader of the ELN demanded that the government guarantee the group’s financing. Around thirty people are currently being held by the ELN, founded in 1964 by sympathizers of Ernesto “Che” Guevara and the Cuban revolution, while awaiting payment of a ransom, according to the government.
Gustavo Petro, the first left-wing president in Colombia’s history, has begun talks with the main armed groups operating in the country. With the ELN, but also dissidents from the Marxist FARC (which reject the historic 2016 peace agreement), paramilitary groups and drug traffickers.
This policy of “total peace” encounters numerous obstacles and is severely criticized by the opposition, while some of these armed groups have increased their actions to increase their territorial influence.
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