Chavez urges rebels to give up

Simon Romero |
June 10, 2008

THE Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, has called for Colombia's largest guerilla group to end its four-decade struggle to overthrow Colombia's Government, a surprising policy shift just months after he called for the rebels to be recognised as a legitimate insurgent force.

Mr Chavez's comments came a day after Colombian authorities announced the capture in eastern Colombia of two Venezuelans, including one man identified as a national guard officer, carrying 40,000 AK-47 assault rifle cartridges, which the Colombians said were intended for use by the guerilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Venezuela's Government has been battling accusations from Colombian officials in recent weeks that it has tried to provide arms and financing to FARC. Venezuela might face economic sanctions if the claims are true, since the European Union and United States classify FARC as a terrorist group.

"You in the FARC should know something," Mr Chavez said in his Sunday television program, during which he also called on the rebels to release dozens of hostages, including three American military contractors.

"You have become an excuse for the empire to threaten all of us," he said, using his term for the US.

It was not clear whether FARC would heed Mr Chavez's call or even respond. While Mr Chavez is admired within the ranks of FARC as an iconic leftist leader, FARC is better prepared than any rebel group in recent Latin American history to soldier on, financing its struggle with cocaine trafficking and abductions for ransom.

Still, FARC does seem to be at a turning point. Several senior commanders in the group have been killed in the past year and Colombian intelligence operatives have recently infiltrated the group's top echelons.

Mr Chavez may have been acknowledging the possible disintegration of the group when he said in his televised remarks on Sunday: "The guerilla war is history. At this moment in Latin America, an armed guerilla movement is out of place."

The New York Times