Free Republic

Venezuela is moving troops to the border with Colombia with technical assistance from Russia and Iran, Colombia's defense minister Diego Molano said on Thursday, calling the possible deployment "foreign interference." Molano, citing intelligence sources, said troop movements were registered in Venezuela opposite Colombia's Arauca province, the scene of fierce fighting between guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN) and FARC dissidents for control of the drugs trade.

BOGOTA, Colombia — Thinking up ways our all-encompassing crisis could get even worse has become a grimly popular parlor game for Venezuelans. For years, the go-to worst-case scenario was civil war between the political factions in our country. These days, an even scarier prospect has begun to displace that in the pantheon of Venezuelan nightmares: armed conflict with Colombia. The reason? Venezuela’s increasingly tight alliance with the drug-running guerrilla armies waging war on the Colombian state, which has rattled Bogota so hard it’s now seeking a hemispheric response. On Wednesday, Colombia, the United States and nine other countries invoked the...

SNIPPET: "WASHINGTON – Four members of a violent guerilla organization were indicted on Friday on conspiracy and hostage-taking charges stemming from the kidnapping of more than 60 people in Colombia in 2000, including three United States nationals."

SNIPPET: "BOGOTA – Colombian authorities detained an Ecuadorian man who crossed the border with 25 kilos (55 pounds) of explosives officials say were meant for the small ELN rebel group. The smuggler, Antonio Peña Perugachi, was arrested in Tuquerres, a village in the southern border province of Nariño. He was carrying 50 packets of pentolite, a high-power explosive, destined for a unit of the National Liberation Army, or ELN, police said in a communique."

Marxist rebels' open letter asks South American body to facilitate peace talksColombia's largest insurgent group asked the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) to help resolve the country's decades-old political struggle in a open letter published Wednesday. "Although the government of Colombia has closed the door to dialogue with the insurgency spurred on by the mirage of a military victory and Washington's interference, we want to convey to the Union of Nations of the South, UNASUR, our unyielding determination to seek a political solution to the conflict," said the letter from the communist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), published...

War: A Spanish court has charged Venezuela with collaborating in a terrorist plot to assassinate President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia. That's an attempt on a top U.S. ally, and calls for a hard response. If it's not predator-drone time, it's time to name Venezuela as a state sponsor of terror. What came to light Monday isn't the first time Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has been caught aiding terrorists, but it may well be the most egregious. Spanish Judge Eloy Velasco named a Venezuelan government official as a key link between 12 FARC and ETA terrorists who were indicted in a 2003...

The situation in neighboring Venezuela is going from strange to foreboding. President Hugo Chavez has been unsuccessful in getting the voters to make him president for life, but he has used his presidential powers to replace thousands of key officials with people selected mainly for their loyalty to Hugo Chavez. Since the government controls so much of the economy (mainly because of the oil industry), this has had disastrous results. There are increasing power blackouts, and an increasing number of state employees are not getting paid, or paid on time. There are increasing shortages of consumer goods. There is growing...

Colombian Football Team 'Killed' By Will Grant BBC News, Caracas At least 10 bodies - believed to be those of a kidnapped Colombian football team - have been found across the border in Venezuela. The bodies, with multiple gunshot wounds, were found in Tachira. One of the team is reported to have survived. State authorities say they suspect a left-wing Colombian guerrilla group, the ELN, is to blame for the deaths. The team, kidnapped two weeks ago, was known as Los Maniceros or Peanut Men, as they sold nuts along the border. The Venezuelan authorities say they are still investigating...

December 8, 2008 Note: The following text is a quote: http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2008/December/08-nsd-1072.html Colombian Terror Organization Leader Indicted for Two Separate Hostage Takings of U.S. Citizens in 1999 and 2003 WASHINGTON - A federal grand jury in the District of Colombia has indicted Carlos Marin Guarin, also known as "Pablo," also known as Gustavo Anibal Giraldo Quinchia, a high-ranking member of the terrorist group the National Liberation Army (in Spanish the "Ejercito De Liberacion Nacional," or "ELN" for short), in connection with two separate hostage takings of United States citizens which took place in Colombia in 1999 and 2003, U.S. Attorney Jeffrey...

EL CRUCE, Venezuela (AP) — Leftist rebels fighting Colombia's U.S.-backed military have increasingly found refuge in Venezuela, where they get weapons, food, medical treatment and a smuggling route for the cocaine that keeps them afloat. Former rebels, local citizens and Colombian officials told The Associated Press that hundreds or even thousands of Colombian insurgents are in Venezuela at any given time. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who last month publicly recognized the rebels as "insurgent forces," denies directly supporting them. He blames Colombia for failing to police their 1,370-mile border. But former rebels say the two main Colombian rebel groups, the...

HAVANA, May 22 (Reuters) - Colombia's second largest guerrilla movement said on Tuesday it would agree to a cease-fire if the government dropped a free-trade pact signed in November with the United States. Setting new conditions for peace, the National Liberation Army (ELN) also demanded a freeze of all privatization of state companies, including the Cartagena oil refinery and 20 percent of the state oil company ECOPETROL. A cease-fire is the major stumbling block in the peace talks, which began 17 months ago in Havana in a bid to end the Cuban-inspired guerrilla insurgency begun in 1964 by radical students...

ON SEPTEMBER 24 the International Atomic Energy Agency passed a resolution that, in part, called on Iran "to observe fully its commitments and to return to the negotiating process that has made good progress in the last two years." The resolution is just the latest chapter in the ongoing dispute over Iran's nuclear programs, but a look at the votes cast by the IAEA's members reveals a great deal about the international landscape: Of the IAEA's 35 board members, 22 voted in favor of the resolution, 12 abstained (including Russia, which is heavily invested in Iran's nuclear programs), and one...

Bogotá. The ex-chief of the Colombian secret police Jorge Enrique Díaz, murdered two weeks ago in Venezuela, had crossed the border to arrest a guerrilla with the National Liberation Army, ELN, according to Cambio magazine. The weekly magazine said that Díaz, ex-director of the Administrative Department of Security (DAS, secret police) in Cúcuta, apparently attempted to arrest on Venezuelan soil Ramiro Vargas, an ELN leader, according to Efe. Díaz was found dead and with signs of torture April 17 near La Fría along with Sargent José Celis and another soldier who has not been identified. "The idea was to capture...

...My Venezuelan contact assured me that there is evidence of infiltration in the Ecuadoran armed forces. He also told me that Chávez envisions an axis of power linking Brasilia, Montevideo and Buenos Aires. As it is, these populist governments aren't much for standing on principle and anything anti-Yanqui scores cheap domestic points; some may even aspire to Venezuelan-style authoritarianism. But it is also possible that cooperation with Chávez is part survival technique to ward off his use of bullying militants. ...[T]he revolution must necessarily "break the spine of democracy in the region. That is Colombia." Colombians are specifically worried about...

The Venezuelan government plans to buy military equipment for USD 2 billion. The exact amount is still unknown, but negotiations are ongoing. The Venezuelan state will pay USD 400 million for 100,000, model AK-103 and AK-104 Russian rifles, according to the Spanish firm Análisis e inteligencia.com. A similar amount will involve the purchase of 33 choppers. During a visit to Venezuela last November 2004, representatives of Russian exporter Rosoboronexport explained that in 2005, a total of 20 choppers, model MI17B5 and 13, model MI35M (10 assault aircrafts and 3 logistic planes) would be delivered.

London 23.01.05 | Yesterday morning I listened to what appears to be a VHF communication, although it has been reported as a telephone conversation, between FARC leaders Juan Santrich and Jorge Tivieras. Radio Caracol of Colombia reports that Tivieras is thought to be the international liaison chief of a guerrilla front with seat in Caracas, Venezuela's capital. Tivieras gives account to Santrich about 41 credentials that he has obtained for an equal number of guerrilla members to assist and participate in the officialy sponsored Bolivarian congress held in Caracas on December 6-9 2004. Furthermore Tivieras states that he is in...

Leftist “militants” ushered in the new year in Colombia in true form: Members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) murdered 17 peasants, including 6 women and 4 children, who were gathered to celebrate New Year’s Eve. When I say “true form,” I mean FARC was practicing the art that the extreme left has mastered, perhaps invented: terrorism. On this New Year’s Eve, the FARC was proving it believes the “end justifies the means,” as it is the grotesque, disfigured child of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and, yes, even Hitler -- remember, he was a National Socialist (Nazi). FARC is...

BOGOTA, Colombia -- Colombia's smaller leftist rebel group kidnapped a Catholic bishop but planned to set him free bearing a political message for the government, church officials said Monday. Monsignor Fabian Marulanda, secretary-general of the Bishop's Conference, said Misael Vaca Ramirez, the Bishop of Yopal, was taken by members of the National Liberation Army, or ELN, on Sunday near the town of Morcote, 220 miles northeast of the capital, Bogota. He said the ELN had informed the church that Vaca Ramirez would be released unharmed at an unspecified date with a message for the government. ELN leaders have been trying...

Brussels - The European Union has added Colombian rebel group the National Liberation Army (ELN) to its terrorist blacklist, officials said on Monday. The decision, which entails the freezing of the Cuban-inspired group's assets in Europe, was confirmed in the EU's Official Journal, which published the updated list. The ELN is the third Colombian group to be included on the list since 2002, after the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and the right-wing United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia. Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has pressed hard for the ELN to be added to the list, which now comprises 26...

See part one of series, Castro's Power Grows, and map of dictator's influence. Part two: Brazil Shifts Left, Considers Nuclear Option. Part three: Venezuela Falls Into Castro's Orbit. In this final part of the series we examine the unfolding of the new pro-Castro alliance that stretches from his island gulag to Venezuela, Colombia, Brazil, Bolivia and Ecuador. Colombia: For some years Colombia has been the target of Marxist narcoterrorists who finance their drive to take over the government and install a communist regime by operating a huge and multibillion-dollar drug operation. The guerrillas, known as FARC, have murdered thousands of...