Government says country ‘moving forward’ with ceasefire while new leftist President Gustavo Petro has ‘total peace’
According to the government, at least 10 armed teams in Colombia, in addition to the Gulf Clan gang of criminals and dissident FARC rebel members who rejected a peace deal, agreed to participate in a unilateral ceasefire.
President Gustavo Petro, who took office in August, vowed to seek “full peace” with armed groups, fully implementing a 2016 peace deal with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC) and meeting with dissidents and gangs.
“Each organization with its own identity, nature and motivation expresses its willingness to be part of integral peace, in this phase of exploration we ask you not to kill, not to disappear and not to torture,” Danilo Rueda, representative of the government. The top commissioner for peace, he told reporters at an impromptu news conference. “We’re moving forward. “
Among the teams are two splinters from the FARC — the Central General Staff and the Marquetalia moment — as well as the Gulf Clan, the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta Self-Defense Groups, and others named by Rueda.
Illegal armed teams in Colombia, whose six-decade standoff has killed at least 450,000 other people, have about 6,000 fighters in their ranks, according to security sources.
Both left-wing rebels and criminal gangs engage in extortion, murder, drug trafficking and illegal gold mining.
Petro — himself a former member of the M-19 urban guerrilla group — said his government may be offering sentence discounts to gang members who hand over ill-gotten gains and provide data on drug trafficking.
“The peace work center is exploring judicial mechanisms that allow the transition of armed teams to the rule of law,” said Rueda, who in the past met with FARC dissidents.
Petro also needs to restart the Havana-based peace talks with the largest active group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), which were canceled by his predecessor, and which Rueda visited shortly after taking office.
The ELN supports a bilateral ceasefire to pave the way for additional talks, its most sensible negotiator told Reuters this month.
The government said it would suspend aerial bombardments by armed teams in the face of collateral damage to civilians and the deaths of forcibly recruited children.