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Colombia sparks stand-off after killing rebel boss

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Published Date: 04 March 2008
By IAN JAMES
VENEZUELA and Ecuador ordered troops to their borders with Colombia yesterday, as a stand-off intensified after Colombia killed a top rebel leader on Ecuadorian soil.
Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, ordered tanks as well as thousands of troops to the border at the weekend, warning that it would respond if Colombia violated its territory. He closed Venezuela's embassy in Bogotá.

Rafael Correa, the
president of Ecuador, yesterday deployed troops while withdrawing the country's ambassador from Bogotá and expelling Colombia's top diplomat.

"There is no justification," Mr Correa said, snubbing a Colombian offer to apologise.

Mr Chavez called the killing of Raul Reyes and 16 guerrillas an attack by a "terrorist state" and said it showed that Alvaro Uribe, the Colombian president, was a "criminal" acting for the United States empire.

Mr Correa said Colombia deliberately carried out the strike beyond its borders, flying deep into Ecuador to bomb the rebel camp from the south. The Ecuadorian leader said the rebels were "bombed and massacred as they slept, using precision technology".

The Colombian military said the camp was located only just over a mile from the border.

Officials said documents from a computer seized where Reyes was killed suggested Mr Correa has a deepening relationship with the Farc guerrillas.

France said yesterday that Reyes, the rebel commander, was its key contact in negotiations aimed at winning the release of the French-Colombian hostage Ingrid Betancourt.

Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister, said: "It is bad news that the man we were talking to, with whom we had contacts, has been killed. Do you see how ugly the world is?"





The full article contains 278 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 04 March 2008 8:46 AM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
  • Related Topics: Venezuela
 
1

,

04/03/2008 13:42:00
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2

SouthernGent,

04/03/2008 13:53:24
"that allies of the United States have a free pass to attack their nieghbours as and when they please."

So you are saying that Hamas, Hezbolah, FARC, PKK, Taliban and others like them are allies of the US?
3

,

04/03/2008 13:59:35
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4

SouthernGent,

04/03/2008 14:09:27
Your saying what reflects your prejudicies and viewpoint - nothing factual.
5

,

04/03/2008 14:19:50
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6

Dáithí,

San Jose 04/03/2008 15:45:24
Good for Colombia!

A dead Leftist, eh? Good hunting, boys! Here's to many more!
7

John Blackley,

Winter Garden, FL 04/03/2008 21:07:10
Ah, Hugo Chavez getting involved in somebody else's conflict and preparing to start a war to divert attention from his problems in Venezuela!

The man's not stupid. He's learned a thing or two from G. Bush.
8

SouthernGent,

04/03/2008 21:27:17
#5

There you go again, winging out comments with no facts. A FACT is not what you believe to be, but what is. Your hatred will consume you.
9

,

04/03/2008 22:57:04
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10

,

04/03/2008 22:59:18
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11

,

04/03/2008 23:00:35
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12

John Blackley,

Winter Garden, FL 04/03/2008 23:29:53
#9 ptdoug Naughty, naughty, son. The AP site is carrying no such story. Do try harder when you're scratching around for falsehoods to prop up your nonsense.
13

,

05/03/2008 00:00:03
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14

,

05/03/2008 00:34:26
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15

Dáithí,

San Jose 05/03/2008 00:58:49
#13 - ptdoug

>"Colombian military officials have said U.S. satellite intelligence and communications intercepts were provided".

Good! Too bad someone couldn't have provided the same assistance to Poland before Russia and Germany attacked them.
16

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05/03/2008 12:45:27
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17

Lynne,

USA 05/03/2008 17:04:17
Seized laptop shows Chavez-rebel ties
By FRANK BAJAK, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 57 minutes ago
A single laptop can reveal much, and so it is with the digital treasure chest that Colombian commandos found in the jungle quarters of slain rebel leader Raul Reyes.
Files in the computer seized in Saturday's raid into Ecuador that claimed the lives of Reyes and 23 of his comrades offer an intimate portrait of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's desire to undermine Colombia's U.S.-allied government.
If authentic, the documents show that sympathies Chavez first aired publicly in January grew out of a relationship that dates back more than a decade. But Chavez is not one of the correspondents, and his sentiments mentioned in these documents are relayed solely through the rebels.
Venezuela says the documents are lies and fabrications. If they are, they are expertly done.
Not only do they offer an unprecedented glimpse into the rebels' mind-set, they also discuss diplomatic overtures from governments including the United States They are signed electronically by the most powerful men in the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the hemisphere's oldest and most potent rebel movement.
Those signing the documents include:
— cryptically — and France — explicitly.
18

Lynne,

USA 05/03/2008 17:06:38
CONTINUED...

• Reyes, the FARC's foreign minister and public face, whose killing struck a chilling blow to the group;
• Manuel Marulanda, the rebels' 77-year-old supreme leader;
• Jorge Briceno, their much-feared field marshal;
• and Ivan Marquez, the insurgents' apparent go-between with Chavez. Marquez is believed to live in Venezuela.
Copies of 13 documents were sent to reporters Tuesday by Colombia's national police chief, Gen. Oscar Naranjo. He revealed their existence Sunday as his government came under a withering diplomatic assault for violating Ecuador's territory with the raid.
They indicate that Chavez, seeking to raise the FARC's stature and relieve it of its international pariah status, shares their goal of isolating and discrediting Colombia's president, Alvaro Uribe.
But do they prove that Venezuela was actually financing the FARC's bid to overthrow a democratically elected government? That's not clear.
Naranjo alleges the "300," called the "dossier" in a Dec. 23 message signed by Marquez, refers to a $300 million gift from Chavez to the rebels.
In a Jan. 14 missive, Briceno discusses what to do with the "dossier."
"Who, where, when and how will we receive the dollars and store them?" he asks fellow members of the FARC's seven-man ruling secretariat.
Uribe has worked as no other Colombian president to defeat the FARC. So it's no surprise that in the Jan. 14 message, Briceno discusses a desire to undermine Uribe by making him cede a safe haven to the rebels for talks on a prisoner swap.
"Uribe will become more isolated, together with his boss from the North," a clear reference to President Bush, whose government provides Colombia with some $600 million a year in military aid.
19

Lynne,

USA 05/03/2008 17:07:48
CONTINUED..

In a document dated Feb. 9, Marquez passes along Chavez's thanks for a $150,000 gift when he was imprisoned from 1992-94 for leading a failed coup — and indicates Chavez's desire to smear Uribe.
Marquez tells Marulanda and the other secretariat members that Venezuela wants documentation of damage by Colombia's military to "the civilian population, also images of bombardments in the jungle and its devastation — to use as a denunciation before the world."
Marquez also relays that Chavez's government "invites the FARC to participate in some sessions of the analysis group he's formed to follow Colombia's political situation."
In a letter the previous day to the same recipients, Marquez discusses Chavez's plan to try to persuade leading Latin American nations to help get the FARC removed from lists of international terror groups.
At least three of the documents express Chavez's deep desire to meet with Marulanda, hopefully on Venezuelan soil. Marulanda has reportedly never left Colombia.
Marquez also says Chavez is prepared to offer Venezuelan territory for the FARC's desired prisoner swap, which would be a huge embarrassment for Uribe. The FARC has proposed exchanging some 40 hostages, including three U.S. military contractors, for hundreds of rebels currently in Colombia's jails.
The FARC captured the three when their surveillance plane crashed in February 2003.
The rebels have released six hostages — all Colombian politicians — since Uribe tried to end Chavez's mediation role with the FARC in November, accusing the Venezuelan president of overstepping his mandate.
20

Lynne,

USA 05/03/2008 17:08:56
CONTINUED...
The four freed most recently, on Feb. 27, say hostage Ingrid Betancourt, a former presidential candidate who also holds French citizenship, is extremely ill.
Betancourt has become a cause celebre in France. French contacts with Reyes are mentioned in several documents, including a request that the French envoy, identified only as "Noe," be granted a meeting with Marulanda.
References to U.S. diplomatic overtures are scintillating, if vague.
In a Dec. 11 message to the secretariat, Marquez writes: "If you are in agreement, I can receive Jim and Tucker to hear the proposal of the gringos."
The same message says an Italian referred to only as Consolo has told Marquez "the European Parliament wants to get involved in the prisoner exchange."
Writing two days before his death, Reyes tells his secretariat comrades that "the gringos," working through Ecuador's government, are interested "in talking to us on various issues."
"They say the new president of their country will be (Barack) Obama," noting that Obama rejects both the Bush administration's free trade agreement with Colombia and the current military aid program.
Reyes said the response he relayed is that the United States would have to publicly express that desire.
Another message, to Reyes from a lower-ranking commander and dated Feb. 16, includes mention of a possible purchase of 50 kilos — 110 pounds — of uranium.
Uribe's government has claimed that means the FARC was seeking to build a dirty bomb. But the message discusses a different motive: selling the uranium at a profit.

21

Fred Trucker,

22/07/2009 16:19:14
The Colombian leader needs to wake up real soon before he starts a war.

 

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