And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Subject: NYT: Colombia and Guerrillas Agree to Start Peace Talks
Date: Tue, 4 May 1999 10:22:21 -0500
From: Dennis Grammenos <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
=============================================
The Government and the guerrillas also agreed
to invite outside "persons or countries" to
observe the negotiations and "help overcome
any problem."
___________________ =============================================
NEW YORK TIMES
Tuesady, 4 May 1999
Colombia and Guerrillas Agree
to Start Peace Talks
-----------------------------
By Larry Rohter
SAN VICENTE DEL CAGUAN, Colombia -- After more than six months of
on-again, off-again discussions, the Government and the main left-wing
guerrilla group announced early today that they had agreed not only to
begin formal peace negotiations aimed at ending 35 years of conflict,
but
also to invite international observers to sit in on the talks.
The decision was made after a dramatic and unexpected six-hour encounter
here on Sunday between President Andres Pastrana and Manuel Marulanda
Velez, the top leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia,
known
by its Spanish initials as FARC. The meeting was the first between a
sitting Colombian President and a FARC leader since the Marxist rebels
launched their insurgency in 1964.
At an informal 1 A.M. news conference at a tavern here in this guerrilla
redoubt, with a heavily armed guerrilla commander sitting across from
him,
the chief negotiator for the Government read a seven-point joint
statement
indicating that the two sides had made what he called "a 100 percent
advance" toward an agenda for negotiations.
Not all issues had been resolved, the negotiator, Victor G. Ricardo,
said,
but "little remains," and formal talks will begin this week.
Mr. Pastrana won a decisive victory at the polls last year after having
promised to make a peace settlement his top priority. But the dialogue
with the rebels got off to a rocky start when Mr. Marulanda failed to
attend the first session, in January. Then relations were suspended
altogether after the rebels demanded that Mr. Pastrana take steps to
curb
right-wing paramilitary groups that the Government said were beyond its
control.
For three months, much criticism was directed at Mr. Pastrana, who made
a
significant and unusual concession to the rebels last year to draw them
into the peace effort. He agreed to withdraw all army and police forces
from an area the size of Switzerland that includes this bustling jungle
town, effectively ceding sovereignty over the region to the FARC without
gaining concessions.
The discussions resumed on April 20, shortly after Mr. Pastrana had
ordered the forced retirement of two senior army generals who were
reported to have links to a paramilitary group. With the guerrillas'
facing a Government ultimatum to agree to formal negotiations or
withdraw
their forces from the demilitarized zone by May 7, both sides were under
pressure and eager to prevent a resumption of fighting.
The Government and the guerrillas also agreed to invite outside "persons
or countries" to observe the negotiations and "help overcome any
problem."
The rebels had rejected all offers by international bodies to mediate or
even observe their dialogue with the Government.
Copyright 1999 The New York Times Company
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