IPS-English COLOMBIA: Door ‘Definitively' Closed on Chávez's Mediation Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2007 15:11:59 -0800 ROMAIPS LA HD IP BO COLOMBIA: Door ‘Definitively' Closed on Chávez's Mediation Constanza Vieira CARACAS, Nov 23 (IPS) - ”Hey, I want to ask you a question. How many police officers and soldiers are being held hostage by the FARC?” Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez asked Colombian army chief General Mario Montoya. The telephone conversation lasted maybe half a minute, but the consequences were dire. At midnight local time Wednesday, Colombian President Álvaro Uribe put an end to the efforts by Chávez and opposition Senator Piedad Córdoba to broker an agreement for an exchange of 45 hostages being held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) for some 500 imprisoned guerrillas. An Uribe administration spokesman said the Venezuelan leader had broken an agreement not to talk directly with the Colombian army chief or other members of the military about the hostage question. Córdoba was making phone calls from the presidential palace in Caracas, to arrange meetings with several Colombian figures to inform them of the state of the negotiations and of the results of Chávez's meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy Tuesday in Paris. Chávez and Córdoba were even planning a quick visit to Uribe, for the same purpose. From an adjoining office, Chávez asked Córdoba who she was talking to, and she responded ”General Montoya.” The president got on the phone, and asked his brief question. Córdoba described her call to Montoya as ”routine.” Uribe's peace commissioner, Luis Carlos Restrepo, said he had taken over the efforts to facilitate an agreement, and would ”redirect them as necessary, in a discreet manner.” ”It is very clear to us that this public spotlight generates huge risks,” he added in a press conference Thursday in the seat of the presidency in Bogotá. But journalist Carlos Lozano, a senior member of the Colombian Communist Party and an expert on the issue of the hostage-prisoner exchange, stated that ”to say thatàRestrepo is going to resume contacts with the guerrillas for this purpose is a bad joke, because he has never had contact with them, and on the contrary has invariably thrown obstacles in the way of the facilitators' efforts.” In an email response from Caracas to questions from IPS, Lozano said the efforts made by Chávez and Córdoba since August were ”productive” and had ”reawakened hope for a humanitarian swap” of hostages for prisoners, which has broad support among the Colombian population. Chávez and Uribe had agreed that they would talk before any eventual decision to end the Venezuelan leader's assistance in the hostage talks. However, that agreement was not fulfilled. It was Córdoba who informed Chávez of the Colombian leader's decision. The Venezuelan government said it accepted ”this sovereign decision by the Colombian government” but expressed ”frustration” at the cutting short of a process ”carried out amidst great difficulties” and which had made ”important advances that already pointed to the possibility of a solution to this essentially human drama.” Caracas sent the hostages' families ”a message of faith, first in God and then in the good judgement of those who have in their hands the power to make, in time, wise rectifications and decisions.” Venezuela, ”despite this regrettable decision by the government of Colombia, has an open heart and arms to continue lending its humble services for the sake of life and peace,” the government said in a communiqué released Thursday. Alfredo Rangel, an expert in military issues and director of the Bogota-based Security and Democracy Foundation who previously ran for the Senate on a pro-Uribe ticket, said the government had ”definitively” closed the door to Venezuela's mediation. ”The situation is worse than before. That was made clear by the government's announcement that it will no longer talk about an ‘exchange', only about ‘humanitarian actions.' It will not seek an agreement. The few advances that had been made have been undone. And this no longer has anything to do with Venezuela or, apparently, anyone else,” he told IPS on Friday. The underlying question, said the analyst, is that ”the government was unable to accept the political recognition that the FARC was achieving” by means of Chávez's facilitation efforts. In Lozano's view, Uribe's reaction demonstrates ”that the Colombian government has no interest in peace or a humanitarian exchange. The only option it accepts is a fratricidal war and military rescue operations.” According to the director of Colombia's Caracol Radio station, Darío Arizmendi, from the moment that Chávez reached an agreement that the FARC guerrillas would provide him with proof that the hostages are still alive, the air force began a steady bombing campaign along the entire border with Venezuela. The bombing operations reportedly made it impossible for an envoy sent by Chávez to pick up the solid ”proof of life” in Colombian territory and bring it to Caracas prior to the Venezuelan leader's meeting with Sarkozy. Chávez's envoy already has the evidence that the hostages are alive, according to Arizmendi, and ”right now is holding tight here, in some little village, waiting for a miracle to occur.” On Wednesday morning, several ruling coalition legislators visited the Colombian seat of government and, along with Minister of Justice and the Interior Carlos Holguín, reportedly told Uribe that the process had gotten out of his hands and that he should bring it to an end, Arizmendi reported. But Lozano said the president needed no pressure from legislators to call off the process. ”Uribe was already annoyed with the dynamics of the good offices efforts, and was looking for a pretext to cut them off.” ”It was a rude gesture reflecting discourtesy towards the altruistic efforts offered in solidarity” by Chávez, said Lozano. ”Why is President Uribe afraid of President Chávez talking to the Colombian generals? Maybe he's worried they'll become ‘Chavistas'.” General Montoya's human rights record has come under fire in the United States. U.S. intelligence sources have leaked to the press in that country suspicions that he worked closely with ultra-right paramilitaries at the service of drug lord ”Don Berna”, who is now in prison, to eradicate urban guerrillas in the northwestern Colombian city of Medellín in October 2002. In Bogota, meanwhile, U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield complained that the FARC had not provided evidence that the hostages were still alive, prior to Chávez's meeting with Sarkozy. France reiterated Thursday its support for Chávez's efforts to broker an accord, and urged Uribe to keep open the channel of dialogue that the Venezuelan president forged with the FARC over the past three months. ”We continue to believe that Chávez's efforts are the best option for achieving the hostages' release,” said Sarkozy's spokesman David Martinon, who announced that the French president would be sending a letter to Uribe in the next few days. The highest profile hostage held by the FARC is French-Colombian citizen Ingrid Betancourt, whose release Sarkozy has made a top priority. (END/IPS/LA IP HD BO/TRASP-SW/CV/07) = 11231958 ORP011 NNNN