- Title: CUBA: Colombia peace talks said advancing, many challenges ahead
- Date: 22nd December 2012
- Summary: HAVANA, CUBA (DECEMBER 21, 2012) (REUTERS) COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT DELEGATION FOR PEACE TALKS ENTERING NEWS CONFERENCE PHOTOGRAPHERS AT NEWS CONFERENCE VARIOUS OF COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT DELEGATION (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) HUMBERTO DE LA CALLE, HEAD OF COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT DELEGATION, SAYING: "Today we conclude a new round of talks with the FARC. Since we started formally on N
- Embargoed: 6th January 2013 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Cuba
- Country: Cuba
- Topics: Conflict,International Relations,Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA2S35DIABMFX9F999L070HT9SW
- Story Text: Talks to end Colombia's bloody, half-century-long conflict with Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia have made progress, but many challenges lie ahead, negotiators for the government and FARC said on Friday (December 21).
The two sides are trying to end a war that dates back to 1964 when the FARC, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, was formed as a communist agrarian movement to fight the country's long history of social inequality.
Tens of thousands of people have died and millions have been displaced in South America's last Marxist-led armed rebellion, a vestige of the Cold War.
Former vice president Humberto de la Calle, speaking after the two sides finished their second round of meetings and broke until Jan. 14, said the meetings being held in Havana, Cuba are paying off with 'concrete advances'.
"Today we conclude a new round of talks with the FARC. Since we started formally on November 19, we have had 21 sessions with more than 100 hours of intense work and concrete advances. It's what we predicted," said de la Calle, who read a statement but did not take questions.
Three previous peace attempts have failed, but Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos hopes a decade-long, U.S.-backed offensive has weakened the rebels enough that they will want to end the fighting on the best possible terms.
The negotiations have begun with the topic of rural development, the first of six points to be addressed.
"It's a big challenge. We still have five sensitive and vital points to discuss. We have (to discuss) political participation, what will happen at the end of the conflict with the FARC putting down their arms and reincorporating into civilian life, the solution to the problem of illegal drugs, and the plan for guarantees," de la Calle read.
But de la Calle said neither the FARC nor the government had to give up too much for a peace deal.
"They don't have to abandon their ideology. The government doesn't have to change their model of society, and that's why we've said we are not negotiating with the Colombian government's model of development or the democratic system," he said.
De la Calle added that both sides had agreed on unprecedented civic input. So far Colombians, whose opinions are being sought online and in public forums, had provided nearly 3,000 suggestions to aid the peace process, some of which were being closely studied.
He said the negotiators also were receiving ideas from development experts and from peasants about how to improve life for the rural poor in Colombia.
FARC negotiators said they felt that they were the true representatives of the Colombian people.
"The basis of our presence in Havana is to lift our voice so that the will of the people is expressed and for the government to understand the changes that are required so that the majority of people in our country not continue to suffer the poverty, the displacement, plundering, terror and death," said FARC negotiator Ivan Marquez.
One of the FARC's main grievances since taking up arms in 1964 has been the unequal distribution of land, which has been concentrated in the hands of a few since the Spanish conquered the region around the 16th century.
But over the conflict's long history, millions of Colombia's rural poor have been forced from their homes by FARC rebels and right-wing paramilitary groups who later used the land to fund their fighting forces.
FARC negotiator Rodrigo Granda said they had not reached an agreement on rural development, the first point.
"On this point (agricultural development), we can't put any conclusive terms. We are going to work with equilibrium and with patience, without stopping, to see how we can wrap it up in the shortest time possible but without rushing," he said.
If peace is not achieved, the FARC still has 9,000 troops that can keep inflicting damage on the continent's fourth-largest economy.
The FARC declared a two-month unilateral ceasefire when the talks began in November in Havana and complained this week that the government had not joined it in laying down arms.
Instead, the government has kept up its offensive, killing at least 20 FARC guerrillas in one attack this month.
Santos has vowed to maintain military pressure instead of allowing the rebels to regroup as they did during previous failed peace talks a decade ago.
He wants to peace process wrapped up by November, 2013, although the rebels said it could take much longer.
FARC member Tanja Nijmeijer, a Dutch national, said both sides were focused on reaching a consensus.
"There's a real-- how do you say that?-- willpower of the FARC EP and also the Colombian government to get to an agreement and we hope this will lead to peace with social justice in Colombia," she said.
Various peace efforts in Colombia since the 1980s have brought mixed success, with some smaller armed groups demobilizing. But the FARC, Latin America's biggest rebel group, has pressed on, funded in large part by drug trafficking.
The FARC, which traces its roots to the peasant self-defence forces of the 1950s that fought against wealthy landowners, wants to change Colombia's economic system, which Santos' government flatly rules out. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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