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Colombian President Gustavo Petro called on the National Liberation Army (ELN) armed group to fully commit to a peace process and work seriously on a ceasefire on Saturday. In a gesture of goodwill, the leftist leader also declared his willingness to grant the group the status of a political formation.
Petro wants to tone down the tension with the ELN. The Statements by the Colombian president were given during a meeting with representatives of peasant organizations and leaders of ethnic organizations in the town of Olaya Herrera, in the department of Nariño, in the southwest of the country.
During the meeting, Petro alluded to the possibility of granting a political status to the armed group, expressing his intention to carry out such an action. “We want to give the ELN that political status but recognizing the new reality. To that extent, I propose that we seriously work on a ceasefire. That they stop killing each other, that it be a cessation of hostilities to society,” he said.
The day before, the president had called for a “forceful strategy” against the “illicit economy” and assured that concrete measures would be taken to combat this scourge. “It is necessary to close the tap so that these groups do not buy more weapons and swell their ranks,” the president declared.
The ELN delegation, which is negotiating a peace agreement with the government in Cuba, has accused Petro of “stigmatizing” the guerrillas by referring to the “illicit economy.”
On the other hand, this same delegation expressed its dissatisfaction with the president’s statements this Saturday, arguing that Petro’s words are “direct questions” part of a “disrespectful and stigmatizing treatment of our organization.”
“It supposes a fundamental questioning of the political meaning of the Dialogue Table and its entire architecture, including the legitimacy of the Government Delegation, the guarantor countries, the accompanying organizations (UN and the Colombian Episcopal Conference) and the accompanying countries,” he explained. the group.
The Colombian president proposes a new approach for territorial peace
The Colombian president also made a proposal for the ongoing peace process with the country’s armed groups. Petro put work on the concept of territorial peace on the table.
“We must look at peace from the territorial prism. We can choose a new specific region and begin to expand it in the Colombian space. And, to the extent that we consolidate the new regions, we choose one, Nariño could be, but let’s start a cessation to fire, a ceasefire, a process that can generate confidence in Colombian society,” he said.
The president added that if they accepted his proposal, the State could enter those areas “and demonstrate that it is possible to exchange one economy for another.” In addition, he assured that “the combatants themselves could take over the decisions and benefits of this new legal economy.”
This proposal arises in the middle of the third cycle of dialogues that began at the beginning of the month in Havana. The bilateral ceasefire and the participation of civil society are two of the three priorities of this stage in the negotiations.
The Colombian government has been in dialogue since the end of 2022 with the ELN, the largest guerrilla still active in Colombia. The talks began in November in Caracas before continuing in March in Mexico, where both sides agreed to discuss a ceasefire.
In Havana, where the third cycle of negotiations began on May 2, the Colombian team had reaffirmed its desire to achieve peace with the ELN.
According to government negotiator Otty Patiño, Bogotá hopes to achieve a ceasefire before regional elections in October.
Bled dry by half a century of armed conflict, Colombia has attempted numerous peace negotiations with armed groups, many of which have failed. In 2016, however, a historic agreement led to the disarmament of the powerful FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) guerrilla and its transformation into a political party.
But since then, the agreement has struggled to be fully implemented, while a section of the extinct FARC guerrillas has once again taken up arms.
EFE and AFP
