VENEZUELA-COLOMBIA/BORDER-FARC FARC backs Venezuelan government in border crisis with Colombia

Record ID: 142141

  • Title: VENEZUELA-COLOMBIA/BORDER-FARC FARC backs Venezuelan government in border crisis with Colombia
  • Date: 28th August 2015
  • Summary: HAVANA, CUBA (AUGUST 28, 2015) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF FARC DELEGATION ARRIVING AT PEACE TALKS
  • Embargoed: 12th September 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Cuba
  • Country: Cuba
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAEAT5NQ69XKCLY7AZYFZV9VEWD
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: During peace talks in Havana on Friday (August 28) the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) said it backed the Venezuelan government in the ongoing border dispute with neighbouring Colombia.
    Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro shut the border crossings last week after a shootout between smugglers and troops wounded three soldiers. He later extended the closing indefinitely and over a thousand Colombians were deported as part of an alleged crackdown on paramilitary gangs.
    FARC negotiator Jesus Santrich expressed the group's support for the move, claiming that paramilitary groups operating in the border area need to be 'uprooted.'
    "We must respect the sovereignty of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and stop the treachery which means uprooting the paramilitarism that has created so many victims in Colombia," he said.
    Venezuela, in addition to Cuba, is acting as guarantor nation in the ongoing peace talks between the Colombian government and the FARC in an attempt to reach a peace accord to end five decades of war.
    Santrich said the two countries, which share a 2219 km (1379 mile) border, must stand united.
    "As neighbouring countries we need to unite so that peace will prevail, closing the spaces of tension and war-making, so that the rights of the people can shine through above all those who want, through economic war and all kinds of conspiracy, to destabilize the legitimate government of President Nicolas Maduro," he said.
    Maduro, whose Socialist Party is forecast to fare poorly in the Dec. 6 parliamentary election, says the crackdown is necessary to stop the Colombian right, smugglers and paramilitaries from plotting to worsen shortages and subvert him.
    His critics, however, call this a smokescreen aimed at distracting from an increasingly severe economic crisis in the oil-exporting nation.
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