Posted on 08/25/2003 5:21:09 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
BOGOTA, Colombia -- At least six people were killed, including a 6-year-old boy, and 28 more wounded Sunday when two bombs ripped through a crowded riverboat in central Colombia, the army said.
Clashes erupted between anti-government rebels and troops who arrived to rescue the injured.
Authorities blamed the attack on rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, also known as FARC, a Marxist peasant army that has been fighting the government for four decades.
Meanwhile, rebel sources said Colombia's two leftist rebel groups have agreed to form a military alliance and will step up attacks against the government of U.S.-backed President Alvaro Uribe.
The landmark accord, which could herald an escalation in Colombia's four-decade-old guerrilla war, was struck after a series of secret meetings between top commanders of FARC and the smaller National Liberation Army, or ELN.
"The leaders of the FARC and the ELN have agreed to join military forces against the government of Uribe. We will now carry out nationwide joint military operations," a rebel involved in the negotiations said in the mountains of eastern Colombia.
The accord came as Uribe, a close ally in the U.S. war on terror, conducts peace talks with right-wing paramilitary outlaws who have targeted rebels in a war that claims the lives of thousands every year.
The FARC and the ELN formed an umbrella group in the 1980s but it quickly fell apart, leaving rebels to form regional tactical alliances.
The first explosion on the riverboat went off as a woman carrying a box disembarked from the boat that had docked with 56 people in the village of Puerto Rico, 125 miles southeast of Bogota. The second explosion detonated inside the boat, which was packed with civilian passengers, an army spokesman said.
Officials were investigating whether the woman was a guerrilla or if she had been tricked by rebels into carrying the box. Puerto Rico, in the eastern savannas of Meta province, houses a counter-rebel battalion.
Combat between government troops and rebels raged as helicopters flew into Puerto Rico to rescue the wounded, who lay on the docks, officials said. Meta is a gateway to rebel strongholds in the southern and southeastern jungles.
In separate violence, suspected leftist rebels launched a fresh attack on Colombia's second-largest oil pipeline in northeastern Arauca province, detonating an explosive near a town where U.S. Special Forces are training local troops.
The bomb shut down pumping of the 110,000-barrel-per-day Cano Limon, which serves an oil field operated by U.S. Occidental Petroleum Corp., the army said.
About 70 Green Berets are stationed in two military bases in oil-rich Arauca to train a Colombian brigade to defend the Cano Limon pipeline, a favorite target of the guerrillas, who are branded a "terrorist" organization by Washington.
Also in Arauca, the army said it discovered seven mortars packed with homemade gas-cylinder bombs inside a beer truck in Arauquita.
Rebels frequently use the highly inaccurate gas-cylinder bombs to attack police and army barracks, sometimes reducing entire civilian blocks to rubble.
Then along came Mr. Chavez, a former army colonel and leader of an unsuccessful 1992 coup that converted him into an imprisoned criminal and heroic "champion of the poor." A foolish President Rafael Caldera granted Mr. Chavez a presidential pardon, and Mr. Chavez ran for president on a moderate platform promising sweeping reforms and a healthy house-cleaning of government corruption. This won him wide support from the poor and disarmed the fears of the more wealthy, who hoped Mr. Chavez would deliver on his promises. Mr. Chavez won the presidency with the support of just 35 percent of the electorate.
Soon afterward, the trouble began. Mr. Chavez established friendships with the most radical leaders in the world, beginning with Cuba's Fidel Castro, but also including Libya's Moammar Gadhafi, Iraq's Saddam Hussein (whom he called "My brother"), North Korea's Kim Yong-Il and the Palestinian Yasser Arafat, among others. Mr. Chavez celebrated the September 11 attacks in the United States, and reportedly gave money to the Taliban and al Qaeda. He has supported terrorist Carlos the Jackal, and established close ties with Colombia's narco-terrorists (ELA and the FARC), permitting them to operate, train and rest in Venezuelan territory.
Recently, Venezuela's permissiveness — if not outright support — for terror groups inspired U.S. Army Gen. Richard Boyer to compare Venezuela with Syria. The next day, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said "the government of the United States and the people of Venezuela have a differing view of democracy than does President Chavez." Taken together, these comments are a clear shot across the bow of Mr. Chavez. Mr. Chavez's anti-democratic behavior and support of terror groups is earning him an associate membership in the "axis of evil." ***
(Marxist terrorists) July 20, 2003 - FARC declares candidates military targets in Oct. 26 elections [Full Text] BOGOTA, Colombia -- Colombia's largest guerrilla army, the Marxist-inspired FARC, has threatened to kill all candidates for October municipal elections, saying they and their families will be declared military targets. In a letter sent to the nation's mayors, obtained by Reuters on Saturday, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia said the threat extended to candidates for mayor, governor, city council members and provincial lawmakers.
The nationwide vote, the first election under the government of President Alvaro Uribe, will take place Oct. 26. The president took power last year promising to make Latin America's most violent nation safe again. "Those who register as a candidate for the election will be declared military targets. You and your families in any place where the FARC are found will subjugated to country's armed conflict," the letter read.
Commanders of Colombia's armed forces said they were aware of the letter and would guarantee security for all of the candidates, who must register within the coming weeks to be eligible. In mid-2002, the FARC threatened to kill or kidnap all mayors and municipal government officials in a move it said was aimed at destroying the state from the bottom up. The threat forced many politicians to take refuge in distant military bases, governing remotely. Twelve Colombian mayors were killed in 2002, and police blamed most of the killings on Marxist rebels. The FARC also kidnapped 12 provincial lawmakers last year. [End]
(Paramilitary) July 29, 2003 - Castano: Colombia Violence Was Inevitable - Pledged To Demobilize ***As his United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia prepare to disband as part of a peace agreement with the government, Castano sought to justify the tactics the outlawed right-wing militia group used to fight leftist rebels for nearly two decades. In a message dated Sunday and posted on the Web site of the AUC, as the group is known by its initials in Spanish, the paramilitary chief claimed his fighters prevented guerrillas from taking over Colombia…….
…….Government peace commissioner Luis Carlos Restrepo has said the government is endorsing a plan in which paramilitary leaders would avoid jail if they follow through on promises to disarm. The militia leaders could face alternative sanctions such as paying compensation to their victims' families, Restrepo said. Castano has pledged to demobilize his estimated 12,000 fighters by the end of 2005, removing a brutal element in Colombia's war, now in its 39th year. Paramilitary splinter groups, estimated at 6,000 fighters, have refused to join the peace process
That's strange. I would imagine she was probably tricked into carrying it and didn't know what she had; FARC and all the Marxist guerrilla groups seem to have some connections with Hizbullah and other Islamic militants operating in other parts of LatAm, but I don't think they've yet gone directly to suicide bombings themselves.
By Ibon Villelabeitia
BOGOTA, Colombia, Aug 20 (Reuters) - Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe said on Wednesday he had asked Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez to pass a message to leftist guerrillas that he is willing to start peace talks.
Uribe's comments are the first time the Colombian president has publicly suggested a link between the left-leaning Chavez and the Marxist-inspired Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish initials FARC.
Relations between Bogota and Caracas have been strained periodically over accusations by the Colombian military that Chavez is letting FARC rebels use Venezuela as a staging ground for attacks.
In February, Colombia's interior minister accused Chavez of meeting "frequently" with FARC rebels, but was publicly reprimanded by Uribe after Venezuela threatened to break off diplomatic relations.
Chavez, who has criticized Colombia's U.S.-backed "Plan Colombia" offensive against drug-traffickers and guerrillas, denies he is collaborating with the guerrillas, who are described as "terrorists" by Washington.
"Last week I told Chavez: 'President, stop worrying so much about Colombia's security policies. Tell the FARC that if they are bored with our policies, they can negotiate with me in five minutes'," Uribe told a university audience in Bogota.
Colombian media have alleged that Manuel "Sureshot" Marulanda, the top FARC commander, has been hiding in neighboring Venezuela since the Colombian government broke off peace talks with the rebel group in February 2002.
Uribe, a close U.S. ally in the war on drugs who took office in August 2002, has launched an offensive against the 17,000-strong FARC, which originated 39 years ago in a peasant uprising.
He has said he will only negotiate peace with rebels if they agree to a cease-fire. On Sunday, FARC guerrillas fired assault rifles as Uribe's helicopter flew into a village in northern Colombia.
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