FARC number 2 has been killed in combat near Colombia-Ecuador border
Andean diplomatic crisis > Breaking newsBy equinoXio
Saturday 1 March 2008 12:13 COT
Este artículo está disponible en ESPAÑOL
Luis Édgar Devia Silva, aka Raúl Reyes, the number 2 commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), has been killed by security forces, Colombian Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos said Saturday morning.
According to Mr Santos, "human sources and information verified by the State’s intelligence" told Colombian authorities that guerrilla fighters from FARC’s 48th front would meet with Reyes in Granada, a place near Colombia’s border with Ecuador on Friday night. An joint operation of Colombia’s Military Forces and National Police was held starting at 0:25 local time (5:25 UTC) on Saturday.
Colombian Air Force bombed a guerrilla camp, located 1.8 km from the border inside Ecuador, near Santa Rosa, from Colombia’s air space. Guerrilla responded with shooting, killing one Colombian soldier, Carlos Hernández León. According to Santos, Raúl Reyes and Guillermo Enrique Torres, aka Julián Conrado, with other 15 guerrillas, were killed. Their corpses were recovered by Colombian authorities, after the camp was surrounded and Ecuadorian Armed Forces arrived there.
Santos said president Álvaro Uribe Vélez spoke to his Ecuadorian counterpart Rafael Correa about the operation, and congratulated his men, saying that this was an example that "team work gives better results". Questions from journalists were not allowed.
Devia Silva was born in La Plata, Huila, southwestern Colombia, on 30 September 1948. Before joining FARC in the 1970s, he was part of a workers’ union at a Nestlé plant in Caquetá department. He was close to FARC’s top commander Pedro Antonio Marín, aka Manuel Marulanda Vélez or Tirofijo ("Sureshot"), and participated in the negotiations with Andrés Pastrana’s administration during the failed peace process. Raúl Reyes had been charged with rebellion, kidnapping, drug dealing, robbery, and child traffic and molestation, among others.
According to weekly newspaper El Espectador’s website, Liliana López, aka Gloria, Devia’s sentimental partner, and another guerrilla women who would conform his security ring, may have been killed too. Reyes, who acted as a spokesperson in behalf of the terrorist group, could be replaced by Guillermo León Sáenz Vargas, aka Alfonso Cano, who is ideologically a hard liner but allegedly more willing to negotiate with Colombian government. Sáenz is the leader of the FARC’s clandestine political branch, the so-called Clandestine Colombian Communist Party (PC3). Reyes is the first member of FARC’s Secretariat killed in combat.
This killing happens three days after FARC released four congresspeople who were taken hostages between 5 and 6 years ago, thanks to the negotiations by Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez and Colombian liberal senator Piedad Córdoba. FARC hold around 760 hostages, including 40 captives (among them former presidential candidate and French citizen Íngrid Betancourt and three American defence contractors), who FARC wish to "trade" in exchange of imprisoned guerrillas.
This article was published 1 March 2008 on equinoXio. Translated from Spanish by Julián Ortega Martínez
Tags: Álvaro Uribe Vélez, Colombian Air Force, Colombian Army, Colombian Defence Ministry, Colombian National Police, Colombian politics, Ecuadorian Armed Forces, FARC, Juan Manuel Santos, Luis Édgar Devia Silva, Putumayo, Raúl Reyes, Rafael Correa, Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, Santa Rosa
saturday 1 march 2008, 17:51 COT
[…] Lástima morir y pensar que ha sido la causa de sufrimiento de miles y miles de personas. (q.d.e.p.) Más información en equinoXio, la revista virtual. […]
saturday 1 march 2008, 19:27 COT
What I find interesting is the level of detail provided by the Santos, owner of the Narco-Paramilitary Newspaper El Tiempo. The air strikes were carried out from the Colombian airspace against a camp almost 2 km inside Ecuador. The Colombian Police Forces were there and after a while the Ecuadorian Army, and yet the Ecuadorian Army allowed the corpses to be removed by the Colombian Police without carrying an investigation. Hmmm…
On the other hand, Correa publicly expressed knowing nothing and demanded clarification of the incident and a military investigation. Hmm…
What really happened?
The guy who made the traced call to Reyes’ satellite phone was the spy. Who was that guy? Was Chavez? Was one of his Generals? Hmm…
Questions by journalists were not allowed? Hmmm… hmm.
This movie has helped catch the attention of all Colombians. What will the next episode bring? Stay tuned…
saturday 1 march 2008, 19:50 COT
The town of Santa Rosa de Sucumbios is actually an Ecuadorian Indian village near the border with Colombia.
saturday 1 march 2008, 20:40 COT
Your accusation against EL TIEMPO, Tequendamia, of being “narco-paramilitary” can’t be taken seriously by anyone who cares enough to read the actual paper.
And finally…you seem to be hurt by this news. I wonder…
sunday 2 march 2008, 2:31 COT
I am only wondered by Uribe’s stubbornness. Clearly he was really upset about FARC unilaterally releasing 4 lawmakers. FARC treats Uribe as the irrelevant American puppet he is. So the killing of Reyes is just the result of that little man’s anger, trying to scream “I am not irrelevant, I am not a puppet, Bush backs me up”.
Unllike Uribe, FARC will learn from this mistake. The Old Commander will be replaced by a young and more enthusiast one who will try to prove himself worthy of his position. Expect from FARC a response that will provide a powerful, not just an opinion strike.
sunday 2 march 2008, 4:09 COT
It has been revealed that two female guerrillas who survived the massacre and were found by the Ecuadorian Army said they were attacked during their sleep. Most of the corpses found were wearing pyjamas. There was not hot persecution or combat, just a coward slaughter in a perfect paramilitary style.
sunday 2 march 2008, 18:27 COT
After this incident, war between Colombia and Venezuela seems inevitable. A war with Venezuela will be the opportunity Uribe has been waiting for in order to stay in power beyond the constitutional terms. It would be the hecatomb he dreams would put him in the history books.
sunday 2 march 2008, 22:50 COT
The killing of Raúl Reyes was the first important selective assassination or extrajudicial killing carried out by a Latin American government outside its borders and in violation of the international law.
It is very obvious now that the United States has transplanted its Middle East strategies to Latin America. Is Chávez is playing the role of the Ayatollahs of Iran and Uribe the role of Saddam Hussein?
Here are the similarities:
Chavez -> Bolivarian revolution
Ayatollah -> Islamic Revolution
Uribe fumigates its country side population with harmful chemicals
Saddam fumigated the Kurds with chemical weapons.
Chavez led a revolution against the US like the Ayatollahs did
Uribe is a US puppet like Hussein was during the Iran- Iraq war.
Iraq lost that war after 8 years and ended invaded and destroyed by US afterwards. Hussein got hang.
What else?
tuesday 4 march 2008, 5:01 COT
A WAR CRIME
The description made by the Ecuadorian government about the way the slaughter was carried out could be used as the evidence by Human Rights organizations needed to put a case for war crimes in an international court against Alvaro Uribe. In fact, in addition to the violation of sovereignty by Colombia the issue starts to look more like a war crime.
tuesday 4 march 2008, 21:28 COT
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wednesday 5 march 2008, 22:41 COT
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wednesday 5 march 2008, 22:41 COT
[…] days after the killing of FARC’s number two commander Luis Édgar Devia aka Raúl Reyes, who was in a camp inside Ecuador, Colombian […]
saturday 8 march 2008, 7:29 COT
Mexico will demand from the Colombian government substancial compensatiion for the killing of 4 UNAM students in the raid.
Good on you Uribe! You are a genius; UNAM may also demand an apology after your Defense Minister insulted the institution. What a pathetic cabinet you got. It is perhaps the worst administration since Panama was severed from Colombia.
friday 21 march 2008, 13:47 COT
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sunday 6 april 2008, 20:00 COT
[…] But not only for the FARC which, besides all they want to get, do not hide the whiff or revenge for Raúl Reyes’s death. For the other actors involved, the former presidential candidate is also a gold mine to be […]
thursday 10 april 2008, 14:41 COT
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wednesday 14 may 2008, 12:25 COT
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sunday 18 may 2008, 21:58 COT
[…] Here it comes again. Venezuela-Colombia relationships enter a limbo which gets them closer to hell, this time because of the INTERPOL report claiming the absence of manipulation on the laptops seized at the camp where FARC’ second top chief aka Raúl Reyes was killed in March. […]