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News > Colombia

FARC Rebels Propose Joint Effort to Search for Disappeared

  • FARC Commander Ivan Marquez, member of the rebel's negotiating team, addresses the press in an archive photo.

    FARC Commander Ivan Marquez, member of the rebel's negotiating team, addresses the press in an archive photo. | Photo: Archive

Published 31 August 2015
Opinion

The FARC negotiating team expressed optimism at the progress of the talks.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has proposed creating a pact with the Colombian government in order to find people who have been forcibly disappeared as a result of the internal armed conflict in the country.

The suggestion was made Sunday by FARC rebel commander Ivan Marquez, in the context the International Day for the Victims of Enforced Disappearances and the end of the 40th round of peace negotiations between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and the Colombian government.

RELATED: Colombia’s Peace Process Explained

“We believe that the (negotiating parties) should agree on commitments for de-escalation that include the search for missing persons, considering that no exceptional circumstances whatsoever — whether a state of war or threat of war, political instability or any other public emergency — should be used as a justification for not taking measures to prevent further victimization,” said Marquez on behalf of the FARC negotiating team.

According to the Colombian prosecutor’s office, the armed conflict has resulted in 50,000 case of forced disappearances, a figure greater than the number of disappearances during the dictatorships of Argentina and Chile combined.

The FARC and Colombian government are already cooperating on a demining pilot project throughout the country. A joint effort to search for people forcibly disappeared as a result of the armed conflict would build on the success of the demining initiative and bring about a further de-escalation of the conflict.

A joint communique released Sunday announced that the efforts to remove mines would continue in the province of Antioquia. The program was briefly suspended July 15 after the death of a Colombian soldier carrying out demining duties. According to Semana magazine, mines alone have caused injury or death to 11,000 people since 1990.

Optimism Over Progress of Peace Process

The FARC negotiating team expressed optimism at the progress of the talks, saying, “We made progress. The process moves towards the Final Agreement.”

The FARC and Colombian government have been holding formal peace discussions since 2012 in negotiations that have progressed further than other recent efforts to end the five-decade-long conflict.

The negotiating parties have reached partial agreements on three of five agenda topics. The 41st round of negotiations, taking place in Havana, Cuba, will begin on September 11.

“Achieving peace will be the greatest triumph of the Colombian people,” said Marquez Sunday.

The FARC have maintained a unilateral cease-fire since July 20, meanwhile the Colombian government has committed to halting its bombings of rebel camps. The U.N. has credited that FARC's unilateral cease-fire with helping greatly reduce violence related to the country's internal conflict. The rebels continue to call on the government to implement a bilateral truce.

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