2023-06-09 23:35:43
The Colombian government and the ELN guerrilla group have agreed on a six-month ceasefire. According to Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez, the “bilateral, national and temporary ceasefire” negotiated in Havana in Cuba was signed on Friday (local time) in the presence of Colombian President Gustavo Petro and ELN leader Antonio Garcia.
The dialogue with the ELN began in 2018 under the then Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos. In 2019, then-President Ivan Duque dropped negotiations after a car bomb attack on a police academy in Bogotá that killed 22.
The left-leaning Petro, himself a former guerrilla, reconnected with the group early in his term as president in August 2022 as part of his “total peace” policy. The peace negotiations began in November last year.
The ceasefire agreement came about after a third round of talks in Havana. A few days earlier, Colombia’s chief prosecutor had canceled an arrest warrant for ELN leader Garcia at the request of President Petro.
In 2016, the largest Colombian guerrilla organization, FARC, signed a peace agreement with the government. Since then, the group Ejército de Liberación Nacional (National Liberation Army, ELN), founded in 1964 by supporters of the Argentine-Cuban revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara, has been the strongest remaining rebel organization in Colombia. According to the authorities, more than 5,800 fighters belonged to it in 2022.
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