Colombian officials are seeking the capture of prominent rebel leaders who are vowing to resume their insurgency, threatening a 2016 accord aimed at ending decades of bloody fighting.
In this photo released by the Colombia's Presidential Press Office, President Ivan Duque gives a statement at Palacio de Narino in Bogota, Colombia, Thursday, Aug. 29, 2019. Duque is lashing out against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro for allegedly providing safe haven to a cadre of demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia rebel leaders who announced they are rearming.
“When we signed the accord in Havana we did so with the conviction that it was possible to change the life of the most humble and dispossessed,” said Marin, better known by his alias Iván Márquez, in the more than 30 minute video. “But the state hasn’t fulfilled its most important obligation, which is to guarantee the life of its citizens.”
The decision to return to arms was overwhelmingly rejected by Colombians, many of whom believe the rebels benefited from a sweetheart pact of impunity. It comes as the peace process is at risk of unraveling because of what critics see as its slow implementation and a surge in killings of social leaders in far-flung rural areas where the rebels had long been dominant.
The court, which has drawn criticism from Duque for being too lenient, said the deserting rebels had lost all benefits under the peace deal. Under the accord, rebels who confess their involvement in war crimes like the kidnappings of civilians and recruitment of child soldiers will be spared jail time and protected from extradition to the U.S., which has charged the FARC’s top leadership with cocaine trafficking.
Marin’s move is “better late than never,” said an ELN commander in Colombia’s western jungle who goes by the alias Uriel. The fighter released a video on social media in which he appeared along a river with his face masked and fist clenched in the air.
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