US To Take Colombia's FARC Off List of Terrorist Organizations

Various sources confirm that senior White House officials are evaluating the measure as part of an inter-agency review process that takes place every five years.

Published 23 November 2021

Opinion

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The United States announced that it would remove the FARC from a list of foreign terrorist organizations, a move intended to demonstrate U.S. support for the peace accord. The Wall Street Journal reported citing U.S. and Congressional officials.

According to the newspaper, the officials said the move could occur on Tuesday, coinciding with the fifth anniversary of the historic peace agreement between then-President Juan Manuel Santos and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia rebels.

It also reports that officials who were part of the negotiating group with the FARC had been quietly pressuring U.S. officials to withdraw the terrorist designation against the group.

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In that sense, the Biden administration would recognize the steps taken by Farc members to transform their group into a political party, now called Comunes.

The lifting of the designation also sends a message to other armed groups on the list, whether in Colombia or in other countries, that the United States wants to put pressure on them to see that they can be removed from the list if they abandon violence.

Last October, the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo had advanced that Washington was beginning to seriously consider the exclusion of the FARC from its list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO).

US removing Colombian rebel group FARC from a list of foreign terrorist organizations to help demonstrate US support for fragile peace agreement with the guerrillas https://t.co/3eTXm6EzwO
Scoop from @vmsalama @WSJForero
— Robbie Gramer (@RobbieGramer) November 23, 2021

Various sources confirmed to the newspaper that senior White House officials were evaluating the measure as part of an inter-agency review process that takes place every five years.

The issue was also the focus of a private roundtable organized by the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) in late October.

"We convened this private roundtable in Bogota to talk about the positive effects that an eventual suspension of the application of U.S. sanctions could have on the former combatants who signed the 2016 agreement," Steve Hege, deputy director of the Latin America program at USIP, told El Tiempo at the time.