Colombia's Uribe offers talks zone

gato-bandido says on Dec 7, 2007, 11:41:

Yes another good move for Uribe, keeping the initiative and making the enemy show once again (by rejecting the offer) that the reason they want the "talks" zone has nothing to do with any talks.

Desideria (Moderator) says on Dec 7, 2007, 11:55:

Sorry, juance, I hadn't seen this. I just read it in El Pais and El Tiempo digital

"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

ColombianoGringo says on Dec 7, 2007, 11:56:

Their immediate bullshit excuse will likely be that they want the town of Florida as the zone and not a rural area as proposed by the government.

goin_south says on Dec 7, 2007, 23:34:

it is clear: the Farc know, that with any meeting place, they are as vulnerable as Uribe and his bunch feel they are... (rightfully so, after the Miscalculatin Ms Betancourt)...

why can't the freakin Chung King Chinese just LEAVE THE FREAKN DOLLY LLAMA and Tibet ... ALONE!

billyb says on Dec 7, 2007, 23:55:

"BBC correspondent Jeremy McDermott says the rebels have been pushing for a much bigger demilitarised zone."

Can any of you FARC sympathizers give an intelligent and honest reason why the FARC would demand such a zone if they really want to negotiate honorably?

Sr Tertius says on Dec 8, 2007, 15:41:

This is very similar to what happened 2 years ago, and it didn't work then, why should it work now? (Revista Semana speculates on some unconvincing reasons). I'm not very optimistic, but hope for the best.

"When the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger" (Chinese proverb)

billyb says on Dec 8, 2007, 18:46:

I still don't see why the FARC cannot accept this proposal to negotiate. Anybody have a good honest reason why not?

Sr Tertius says on Dec 8, 2007, 19:04:

I thought you were asking the "FARC sympathizers." The last time it was a car bomb that made Uribe call it quits. The bomb was attributed to FARC, but that hasn't been clarified. It doesn't matter. Neither Uribe nor FARC have any real motivation to find an agreement. One thing is what they say, which is worthless, and another what they do.

"When the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger" (Chinese proverb)

billyb says on Dec 8, 2007, 19:27:

i guess i should have left the "sympathizer" part out to get more responces to my question :)) But I still don't see why, if they really want to negotiate in good faith, just not say ok, fine, we'll meet you there and deal and if Uribe apenas esta mamando gallo, well they would be calling him on it with the whole world watching (hey, if Uribe is the one balking, I want him exposed also). It seems like a no lose situation for them, assuming that they are serious, which I seriously doubt.

Sr Tertius says on Dec 8, 2007, 19:45:

Well, billy, all I can say is that they seemed to be happy with the Pradera-Florida meeting; it was Uribe who called it off. Further offers from Uribe were rejected on the basis of safety for their own people. But, c'mon, Uribe wanted to meet with disarmed guerrilla with no guarantee that the military would stay away. You can think whatever of the FARC people, but they're not idiots. AFAIK, whether military personnel will be allowed in the new meeting place has not been decided. If it is allowed, I'm sure FARC will say no. And even if they manage to come to an agreement, there is no guarantee that something won't explode somewhere, Uribe calls it off again, and we'd be back where we started.

For the record, I don't think either side wants to negotiate in good faith.

"When the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger" (Chinese proverb)

slguy says on Dec 8, 2007, 19:53:

I know this is a stupid question, but I gotta ask it.

If FARC claims such wide support in the areas they control, why don't they prove it at the ballot box? Or do they not even have even interest in demonstrating their support, absent a rifle? Or- are they somehow outlawed from election?

Just curious.

Before you throw me out, make sure I pay my bar tab

billyb says on Dec 8, 2007, 20:12:

T, then why don't they accept negotiations in Cuba, like the ELN, where we all know they will be safe. The thing that you seem not to want to admit, is that they make these unacceptable conditions, which have no real bearing on the negotiations, to either be able to decline to negotiate, or be given an strategic advantage (a non-stater for anybody not named Pastrana) for doing so. This is not what a serious negotiating partner demand.

Sr Tertius says on Dec 8, 2007, 20:56:

It's not that I don't want to admit that. I think you are partially right, FARC wants to gain something from the moment they sit down to negotiate. What they say, of course, is something else. They invoke the failures of talks in Tlaxcala and Caracas, and they are somewhat candid about wanting to make a political statement out of the exchange. And, of course, it'd be very difficult to do the actual exchange anywhere other than in Colombia.

slguy: Members of FARC, in fact, went to the ballots in the eighties (FARC considers itself a military, not a political organization; its current political branch is the clandestine bolivarian party, or something like that). FARC members became part of a coallition of left-leaning movements, the UP, that became the third political force in Colombia, with substantial results in local elections once they were allowed (the possibility of local elections was, in fact, pushed by FARC in negotiations with the Betancur government). Then, of course, came the genocide of UP: Thousands of UP politicians were physically decimated. Under those circumstances, its hard to persuade them to give up their guns and play again. Evidently, though, they have other motives too.

"When the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger" (Chinese proverb)

Neonovo says on Dec 9, 2007, 04:47:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/americas/12/07/colombia.uribe.ap/index.h...
Colombian leader proposes meeting with unarmed rebels

Freedom for 46 out of 750? I'm wondering how the families of the 700 plus feel....but then again, the first step must be taken some where some how....

Medellin Traveler says on Dec 9, 2007, 06:40:

How about they propose a lottery to see who is included in the 46 to be negotiated for release.

Medellin Es Una Chimba! - www.medellintraveler.com

Medellin Traveler says on Dec 9, 2007, 07:03:

CNN Article ---> Colombian leader proposes meeting with unarmed rebelsStory Highlights
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe suggests first face-to-face meeting with rebels

Under proposal, both sides would meet unarmed in remote location

At issue is exchange of high-profile hostages for rebel prisoners

Uribe's offer comes as ex-government minister says similar plan abandoned in 2006

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- Under international pressure, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe agreed Friday to what would be the first face-to-face meeting between officials of his government and leftist rebels.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe is facing increased international pressure to swap rebels for hostages.

The goal: an exchange of rebel prisoners for dozens of high-profile hostages, including three Americans and a former presidential candidate.

Both sides should come unarmed to an unidentified 95-square-mile zone, far from military and police posts and population centers, where they can be monitored by international and Roman Catholic Church observers.

Uribe's proposal comes amid mounting pressure, especially from France, to swap 46 high-profile rebel-held hostages for hundreds of jailed rebels. Uribe offered no more details, but Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said the talks would last no more than 30 days.

"Compatriots, we have done and will continue to do everything within our hearts to free our hostages," Uribe said.

The proposal moves closer to a long-standing demand by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, for a temporary New York City-size safe haven in the southern Colombian municipalities of La Florida and Pradera for talks on a prisoner swap.

But both sides still are far from coming to terms. The rebels have insisted that their negotiators not disarm for any such talks.

Uribe has long resisted extending an olive branch to the FARC, which killed his rancher father two decades ago. In the same speech, he likened the rebels' treatment of its hostages to Nazi abuses in World War II concentration camps.

Even while proposing hostage talks, Uribe offered up to $100 million in rewards to FARC members who desert the half-century old insurgency and bring a hostage along with them. He also noted that the rebels are holding more than 750 hostages in all.

Since Uribe took office in 2002, U.S.-trained commandos have pushed the rebels deeper into the jungle, and no government official has met face-to-face with the FARC.

The president's speech upstaged the revelation by a former government minister Friday that Uribe's administration inexplicably abandoned a similar proposal in 2006, a month after beginning his second term.

Alvaro Leyva, who has long served as a go-between for the government and the rebels, said Uribe's peace commissioner called him the morning of September 8, 2006, and asked him to cancel his announcement that day of a demilitarized zone in La Florida and Pradera to facilitate a possible prisoner swap.

"The truth is that someone cut it off," Leyva said. He did no specify whom.

Uribe's proposal comes a week after his government released proof-of-life videos of the most prominent hostages that it seized from alleged rebels it captured, and two weeks after he canceled a mediation effort by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

On Thursday, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France directly appealed to the FARC's top leader to free Ingrid Betancourt, a dual French citizen seized as she ran for president in 2002. French, Swiss and Spanish envoys have been meeting privately with the FARC as well.

"It's what we've been waiting for a long time," Betancourt's mother, Yolanda Pulecio, said of Uribe's gesture.

There were doubts, however, about the sincerity of Uribe's peacemaking gesture, and about whether the rebels would respond affirmatively.

Jo Rosano, mother of American hostage Marc Gonsalves, said, "The president can offer all these things, but will the FARC respond?"

The three U.S. hostages have been held since their surveillance plane went down in rebel territory in Colombia in February 2003.

Medellin Es Una Chimba! - www.medellintraveler.com

Medellin Traveler says on Dec 9, 2007, 07:11:

Another CNN Article --> Colombian rebel surrenders with abducted boy,

Female guerrilla turns herself in after fleeing Colombian rebel group

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- A female guerrilla, holding tightly a kidnapped 4-year-old she guarded six months in captivity, turned herself into authorities Tuesday after fleeing Colombia's largest rebel group, the army said.

The guerrilla carried Brian Rincon Arias in her arms during a 24-hour jungle trek to a military base in the northeast border town of Arauquita, Gen. Jose Joaquin Cortes, head of the army's second division, told local media.

The child was kidnapped in June from a nursery school in the city of Cucuta, northeast of Bogota, and ever since was under the care of the guerrilla, who was identified only by her nickname "La Negra."

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, was demanding a $250,000 ransom for the child's release, the daily newspaper El Tiempo reported.

The child appears to have formed a strong bond with his former captor: Images broadcast by RCN network showed the boy grabbing for her hand and hugging her minutes before she was reunited with his parents.

"Thank God he was well looked after, because he looks nice and chubby," said the boy's father, whose face was electronically obscured, in an interview broadcast by RCN.

The guerrilla, who did not speak to reporters and appeared only with her back to cameras, will now a government-run program for the more than 12,000 guerrillas who have deserted rebel ranks in the past five years.

A U.S.-backed counter-guerrilla offensive has pushed the FARC farther into Colombia's countryside and led to the desertion so far this year of 2,603 rebels -- up 42 percent from desertions reported in 2006.

The FARC relies on ransom kidnapping and proceeds from the cocaine trade to finance its half-century old insurgency

Medellin Es Una Chimba! - www.medellintraveler.com

juancegomez says on Dec 9, 2007, 08:54:

Sr Tertius: I may *or* may not be suffering from temporary memory loss...but what Pradera-Florida meeting was called off by Uribe when FARC had already agreed to it?

As for the military being armed in the proposed zone, that kind of goes against two things: the fact that the original proposal made by the "three friendly countries" explicitly called for both parties to enter the zone unarmed, and the fact that this modified version of the same also includes asking for an area where there are no police or military posts to remove in the first place. Add those two elements up and it's hard to imagine the presence of armed soldiers in this new area.

As for the UP, once again, I'm just pointing the following things out for the benefit of those who do not know: Only a very small part of the UP was actually made up of FARC members, compared to those who were not. The overwhelming majority of the FARC did not lay down their weapons, at all, and there are reports that "Jacobo Arenas" himself discouraged this early on. Even as the UP campaigned, there were in fact increasing violations of the truce, on both sides. In such an environment, which I'm not fully describing here but which also included intolerance and paranoia on the military's part and among several other sectors, it's pretty clear that none of the parties did what they had to do, if you ask me.

It's understandable that the experience's bloody outcome increased paranoia and fear among FARC, but let's not forget the other details, even if FARC itself tends to do so.

Sr Tertius says on Dec 9, 2007, 09:30:

Correct me if I am wrong: In late 2005, Spain, France, and Switzerland suggested a meeting in Pradera and Florida (Valle) between FARC and the government. FARC agreed on meeting there (or so they said in their communiques) and the government did too (or so he reportedly said). I believe they were negotiating the extension of the zone to be demilitarized, and whether it was going to be for 30 or 45 days, and things like that, but there was a first agreement of meeting. Then the car bomb in Canton Norte made Uribe call it off.

I don't recall whether Uribe had agreed to demilitarize the area, but I remember him saying that he wouldn't give up his Constitutional duty of providing protection to civilians in any inch of the national territory, blah blah blah, and so I presumed he wanted to go there armed.

No he is saying that he wants to have the meeting in any area where there are no police or military outposts. That doesn't mean, however, that the military cannot go in. I'm sure the FARC secretariat is paranoid enough to demand this particular statement from Uribe before agreeing on walking in.

I agree with everything you say about UP. I even think that conditions are very different today than they were back then: The PDA has been able to campaign successfully with minimal threats against its membership. The FARC people don't see it that way, though.

"When the finger points to the moon, the fool looks at the finger" (Chinese proverb)

juancegomez says on Dec 9, 2007, 10:45:

It's my understanding, at least right now, that FARC never said "yes" to the 2005 proposal, which is why I find that interpretation surprising. My memory isn't perfect, of course.

But in fact, as far as I can recall, FARC never really *directly* answered it (or if they did, it took an absurdly long time and wasn't a "yes" anyways), after the government made its own public announcement which led to criticism because it was supposedly made "too quickly" (possibly...I, on the other hand, believe that the government should still have continued publicly pushing the proposal, even making it more flexible around the corners if necessary, but not letting it fall from the public discourse). That's one thing.

As for what happened next..quite a few months later in 2006, after being re-elected, Uribe began to make (or it was made public that he was making / endorsing) new moves through Alvaro Leyva (mainly), an effort which seemed initially hopeful (rightly or wrongly) until the government indeed pulled the plug after the car bomb. That wasn't dealing with the 2005 proposal per se, as far as I can remember.