2024-02-09 22:18:02
The Government of Colombia and the armed group Second Marquetaliaa dissidence of the extinct FARC led by the guerrilla Iván Márquez, announced the start of talks for the signing of a “peace agreement”, within the framework of the “total peace” efforts promoted by President Gustavo Petro.
With about 1,600 combatants according to military intelligence and considered the hard wing of the dissidents, the Second Marquetalia had until now remained outside the negotiations that President Petro is holding with the majority of the country’s armed organizations.
The agreement
The 11-point text adopted by the parties announced the start ofe “a process of socio-political dialogues leading to the signing of a peace agreement between the Colombian government and the rebel armed organization Segunda Marquetalia,” created by Marquez in 2019 after his return to underground, AFP news agency reported.
The Government and the rebels also committed to “immediately develop prior agreements for the de-escalation of the conflict and implementation of transformations for the social and environmental construction of the territory,” according to the statement in which they confirmed the formal start of this ” process of sociopolitical dialogues”.
Likewise, in the joint statement, The Governments of Norway, Cuba and Venezuela are requested “for their good offices in the development of this process” and the Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations in Colombia, Carlos Ruiz Massieuand to the Episcopal Conference of Colombia “its support”.
On the other hand, they commit to “make all possible efforts to dignify the lives of Colombian men and women and contribute to solving the problems that affect the conditions of existence of human beings.”
According to the text, the parties agreed “on the need to carry out an orderly, agile, rigorous and respectful peace process, which provides tranquility and certainty to Colombian society in the genuine commitment to the political solution and the construction of peace.” , both parties have signed.”
The bet
The first leftist president of Colombia is committed to a final negotiated solution to six decades of armed conflict and violence, after the historic peace agreement that seven years ago disarmed the bulk of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
Luciano MarinMárquez’s real name, is a 69-year-old hardline rebel, and was one of the FARC negotiators in the peace agreements that were signed in Havana in November 2016. Márquez has dozens of arrest warrants in Colombia and the United States for serious crimes such as drug trafficking and hundreds of murders are blamed on him.
His return to arms in 2019 meant one of the strongest blows to the peace process that reintegrated some 7,000 combatants of what was the largest guerrilla in America into civilian life. Most of them stuck to the agreement. A former religious and professor, the guerrilla was the victim of an attack in Venezuela in 2022, according to press reports.
Drug trafficking routes
Last July, local media speculated about his death, but the then peace commissioner, Danilo Rueda, denied it. Independent studies indicate that the Second Marquetalia maintains a confrontation with other rebels of the former FARC over drug trafficking routes.
The Colombia Europe United States Coordination (CCEEU), celebrated on its social networks the Peace dialogue with the Second Marquetalia. “We hope that they will soon result in a relief to the humanitarian situation in regions like Putumayo and Nariño and an end to the polarization and fracture of communities“, they wrote on X (former Twitter), which the organization distributed through various media.
The beginning of this new peace process occurs within the framework of an official visit by the United Nations Security Council to Colombia to support the implementation of the 2016 agreement and support the Government’s new attempts to defuse the conflict.
In the text, heThe parties call on the “good offices” of Venezuela, Norway, Cuba, the UN and the Colombian Episcopal Conference, which on other occasions have been guarantors of peace processes in the country..
Colombia is the largest producer of cocaine in the world and is experiencing an armed conflict that in more than half a century has left 9.5 million victims, most of them displaced.
Advances and setbacks
Petro’s “Total Peace” project is advancing with some ups and downs and so far the greatest achievement has been the dialogues with the guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN) in Cuba and, in Colombia, with rebels of the Central General Staff (EMC). , the largest dissident in the FARC, to abandon extortionate kidnapping.
Among the ups and downs in the negotiations is the announcement of an “indefinite armed strike” in the department of Chocó made this Friday by the ELN, despite the fact that peace talks are underway.
“We decree an indefinite armed strike (…) starting at 00:00 on February 10 of this year, in order to safeguard the life and integrity of the non-combatant population,” the ELN said in a statement. The rebels alleged that the armed action is due to the “presence of paramilitarism (…) in compliance with the public force” in the region.