Colombia agrees with ELN rebel group to extend truce
Al JazeeraJAN 20 2024
Colombia announced on Wednesday that peace talks with the leftist guerrilla National Liberation Army (ELN) have been put on hold until the rebel group provides an "unequivocal demonstration of peace."
This comes as the country's president, Gustavo Petro, blamed the Maoist group for an explosives attack on a military base in the department of Arauca, near Venezuela, that left two soldiers dead and 27 others injured on Tuesday.
Petro added that the incident "practically close[d] peace process with blood," comparing it to the bombing of a police academy in Bogotá that killed 22 cadets in 2019 and also caused peace negotiations to collapse.
Unlike past peace processes, Petro's ambitious "totalTotal peace"Peace sought to finally bring the country's decades-long armed conflict to an end ensuring that guerrillas would not be persecuted once demobilized and disarmed. That talks with the ELN have now been called off doesn't discredit the plan, as there has been success in talks with other groups.
RTotal Peace was always a failure waiting to happen as armed groups had no incentives not to continue expanding their territorial control — and these latest developments have proven exactly that. It's certain that Bogotá did sign cease-fires with some guerrilla groups, but the truth is that violence has rather risen under Petro.