COLOMBIA:
Uribe Prepared to Sign
Agreement with ELN
By Constanza Vieira
BOGOTA, (IPS) -
The Colombian government
has essentially opened
up its exploratory talks
with the National
Liberation Army (ELN) to
civil society
representatives, while
saying it is "willing"
to sign an initial
agreement with the rebel
group. If the proposal
is successful, it could
mean the release of as
many as 200 kidnap
victims held by the
guerrillas.
Just when the right-wing
government of President
Álvaro Uribe looked like
it was about to slam the
door on the talks that
began in 2005 with the
ELN, the country’s
second-largest insurgent
group, the
administration announced
Tuesday that it was
prepared to sign the "Acuerdo
Base", a framework
agreement that began to
be discussed in May in
the negotiations hosted
by Cuba.
In his proposal, Uribe
agreed to recognise the
ELN’s legal status as a
party to the talks and
to include in the
Acuerdo Base the word
"conflict", although not
"armed conflict".
Although the Uribe
administration has
steadfastly refused to
accept that terminology
to refer to the violence
in Colombia, the Supreme
Court acknowledged in
July that the country is
in the midst of an armed
conflict.
The government, which
classifies the insurgent
groups that took up arms
over four decades ago as
"terrorists", clarified
that it was only
accepting the use of the
term "conflict" in the
preliminary documents
signed with the ELN "for
the sake of peace."
The government also said
that it would not stop
considering the ELN a
terrorist group,
although it would
refrain from referring
to it as such as long as
the Acuerdo Base is in
effect.
The ELN, which was
founded in 1964 by
leftwing intellectuals
inspired by the Cuban
revolution, is willing
to free people it has
kidnapped. Kidnapping is
its main source of
financing.
Official sources
estimate the number of
kidnap victims held by
the group at more than
400, "but it may be only
half that," said Luis
Eduardo Celis, an
analyst with the
Corporación Nuevo Arco
Iris (New Rainbow
Corporation), a think
tank in Bogotá.
When asked by IPS,
former health minister
Camilo González,
director of the
Institute of Studies for
Development and Peace (INDEPAZ),
concurred with Celis’s
estimate.
"The ELN does not have
the infrastructure to
hold as many kidnap
victims" as reported by
the Defence Ministry,
Celis -- a former ELN
member who left the
group 11 years ago --
told IPS.
"We prefer to purge our
list of cases before
giving out a figure that
is inaccurate," Olga
Lucía Gómez, director of
País Libre (Free
Country), told IPS.
The foundation, which
keeps records on
kidnapping and provides
advice and assistance to
victims and their
families, began the work
of updating its list of
names last week, said
Gómez.
By signing an Acuerdo
Base, the government and
the ELN would commit to
a mutual ceasefire
between the army and the
rebel group.
The conditions set by
the government to agree
to a ceasefire almost
derailed the talks in
the past few weeks. In
response, the ELN
launched a national and
international lobbying
effort "that has
achieved its goal," said
the president of the
Senate, Nancy Patricia
Gutiérrez.
The crux of the issue is
the question of
verification. The ELN
has called for
"technical and
community-based forms of
verification for the
temporary ceasefire and
cessation of
hostilities."
The ELN does not
exclusively dominate any
part of Colombian
territory, unlike the
much larger
Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia (FARC),
which controls an
estimated 35 percent or
more of the national
territory, mainly in
rural, sparsely
populated areas.
In the meantime, the
government’s all-out
military offensive
against the FARC
continues, while the
Black Eagles continue to
expand. That is the new
name of the far-right
paramilitary militias
which "disbanded" as a
result of negotiations
with the Uribe
administration that led
to a controversial
paramilitary
demobilisation process
completed in 2006.
One of the government’s
conditions for a
ceasefire is that the
ELN must concentrate its
troops in one area,
where they would be
guarded by the Colombian
army.
The group would also
have to provide the
names of all of its
members -- a touchy
issue, since the ELN has
historically been
supported by a broad
network of sympathisers,
who far outnumber its
actual armed members,
according to experts.
"That is called
‘surrender’. It is not
viable. The ELN has no
intention of
capitulating," said
military analyst Alfredo
Rangel.
"The ELN has already
basically declared a
truce. It is carrying
out just one armed
operation a month,
almost as a formality,"
added Rangel at a
conference held Tuesday
at the offices of the
Bogotá newspaper El
Tiempo, which was
attended by
international experts on
peace processes.
Meanwhile, in the
presidential palace,
Uribe was accepting, for
the very first time,
international
verification of the
peace process with the
ELN.
According to the
government, the
chronology would look
like this: the Acuerdo
Base would be signed;
the ELN would release
its kidnap victims and
put an end to
kidnappings; and the
government would put
"all of the rest" into
practice.
"All of the rest"
includes: solutions for
the problems of "forced
displacement, forced
disappearances,
widespread and illegal
arrests and political
persecution" of
individuals, among other
measures, according to
the ELN, which also
proposed a start for
demining operations.
(The group’s main
defensive weapon has
been anti-personnel
land-mines).
The government has
offered "a reasonable
timeframe of two months"
to finetune the
mechanisms for the
verification of the
ceasefire, "and we will
"gradually consolidate
the Acuerdo Base so that
it can bring us to a
definitive peace
agreement," the
government’s High Peace
Commissioner Luis Carlos
Restrepo said in a press
conference.
But former health
minister González said
pressure might be
applied to extend the
deadline to six months.
However, "if the
government does not sign
the Acuerdo Base, that
would show that it has
no real intention of
giving the process a
chance to move ahead,"
and "in six months we
would be back in the
same position."
For the past decade, the
ELN has tried to open
the dialogue on peace up
to society as a whole,
by means of a "national
convention". But "it
realises that it has to
‘dissipate’ the conflict
and release kidnap
victims in order for
representatives of the
business community to
agree to take part" in
the proposed political
forum, said Celis.
Donor countries say they
are willing to provide
financing to the ELN for
a time while peace talks
move forward, so that
the group can give up
its practice of
kidnapping.
Uribe made his
announcement about being
willing to sign the
Acuerdo Base during a
gathering of the
National Peace Council (CNP),
whose meeting was news
in and of itself.
The CNP was created by
law in 1998 and is made
up of representatives of
the three branches of
government, oversight
and monitoring bodies,
churches, trade union
confederations, business
associations,
universities, and
organisations
representing small
farmers, ethnic
minorities, retired
members of the security
forces, women, peace
activists, human rights
defenders, and victims
of forced displacement.
"It is a considerable
step forward that the
government has decided
to once again convene
the CNP, which was
established precisely to
try to work towards a
permanent, national
peace policy," former
foreign minister Augusto
Ramírez Ocampo, who is
also a former high-level
diplomat with the United
Nations and the
Organisation of American
States, remarked to IPS.
The CNP "did not exist
anymore. The government
had basically dissolved
it. Today it has
reemerged -- that is, if
it continues to meet,
and we hope that it
will, at least for a
short while," Álvaro
Villarraga, a CNP member
who represents
organisations comprised
of former members of
insurgent groups that
demobilised as a result
of past peace talks,
commented to IPS.
Under the law that
created the CNP, the
president is to convene
a meeting of the
advising body every two
months.
Villarraga said the
government called
Tuesday’s meeting in
order to avoid a legal
resolution and
punishment for failing
to comply with the law.
However, it was the ELN
that asked for the CNP
to resume its meetings.
Preliminary talks
between the insurgent
group and the government
will continue next
Monday in Havana, but
this time with the
presence of a CNP
delegation.
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