Peruvian leaders cry foul as Chávez exports healthcare

• 400,000 Latin Americans take up free surgery offer
• Humanitarian schemes are political front, says Lima

Rory Carroll in Caracas and Andres Schipani in La Paz
The Guardian

The plane door opened and the elderly visitors, all visually impaired and in some cases blind, shuffled out slowly and carefully into Venezuela.

Disease, age and poverty had stolen their eyesight but now they were in the land of Hugo Chávez and that was about to change. A scheme called Misión Milagro - Mission Miracle - had flown them here from Peru for free surgery which would transform their lives.

A portrait of Venezuela's president gazed down from the airport terminal. "It is thanks to Chávez we are here," beamed Rosario Vilcavilca, 88, a peasant farmer in a traditional highland skirt.

Mission Miracle has helped 400,000 impoverished Latin Americans see again and cast Venezuela's revolutionary leader as the region's humanitarian benefactor.

Critics, however, see an agenda behind this and other Venezuelan-linked initatives. They claim Chávez is trying to export populist leftwing rebellions and further tilt the region away from US influence.

Peru waded into the fray last week by accusing Venezuela of funding Peruvian militants under cover of humanitarianism. It said dozens of anti-poverty centres which have sprung up across Peru to promote Mission Miracle, among other schemes, were fronts for political agitation which may have fuelled protests against the government's free market economic policies.

Many centres were linked to a radical leftist organisation known as the Continental Bolivarian Committee, claimed the prime minister, Jorge del Castillo.

"No sovereign country needs to accept actions of other sovereign countries that are done under the table" he said. "Venezuela should act through normal channels."

The president, Alan García, has backed a congressional investigation into the allegations that Chávez is trying to destabilise one of South America's few centre-right governments.

Peruvian police have arrested nine suspected militants who allegedly received cash and directions from Venezuela via leftwing allies Bolivia and Ecuador. Most of the suspects were said to be former members of the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, a guerrilla group which had faded since the 1990s.

The anti-poverty centres, whose bank and telephone records are expected to be checked, deny any agenda beyond helping people access education and healthcare.

Venezuela's ambassador to Lima, Armando Laguna, said Caracas was not offering financial or ideological support to Peruvian militants and said if Peru had proof it should expel him.

There is an unashamed political tinge to the eye-surgery visits to Caracas. Patients are greeted at the airport by officials wearing T-shirts with revolutionary slogans and ushered aboard red buses.

Some of the Peruvian arrivals said their gratitude to Venezuela's president would boost support for Ollanta Humala, Chávez's Peruvian protege who narrowly lost a presidential bid and has vowed to run again. "We're all Chavistas on this bus. Viva Humala!" said Santiago Sanchez.

But it did not add up to subversion. These elderly Peruvian visitors, stricken with cataracts, glaucoma and other ailments were about to have their sight restored courtesy of a pioneering initiative to spread the benefits of Venezuela's oil wealth. Upon returning home they would sing Chávez's praises but seemed unlikely to foment rebellion.

Venezuela also denied another Peruvian allegation - that Venezuela's new embassy in La Paz, Bolivia, would stir indigenous unrest across the region. "It will be a simple building, bigger than the one we have at the moment as we need more space but the rumours about it being a place for training and propaganda are completely false," said Luis Oblitas, a diplomat.

There is no doubt Chávez is seeking to project his influence across South and central America and the Caribbean. He is estimated to have spent up to £18bn on foreign aid largely through subsidised oil and soft loans. He has also promoted trade deals to lure nations out of Washington's ambit.

The question is whether he is breaking laws and infringing sovereignty, something the US practised for decades by sponsoring rightwing coups and shoring up dictatorships.

Opposition movements in Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua claim Chávez has made clandestine payments to their governments to shore up his anti-American alliance. Prosecutors in Argentina are investigating a suitcase filled with $800,000 in cash allegedly destined for the election campaign of President Cristina Kirchner, another Chávez ally. Both vehemently deny it.

More seriously, Colombia has alleged that Venezuela's president gave, or planned to give, $300m to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc). Chávez has scorned the claim but makes no secret of his sympathy for Marxist guerrillas who are deemed narco-traffickers and terrorists by Europe and the US.

Hawks in Washington want Venezuela added to the US list of state sponsors of terrorism, bracketing it with Iran and North Korea. So far the Bush administration has demurred rather than risk disrupting Venezuela's oil flow.

For impoverished Latin Americans such as Luis Nieto, a 67-year-old Ecuadorean who is almost totally blind and has been shortlisted for surgery through Mission Miracle, the politicking is irrelevant. "If Hugo somehow benefits, fine, good for him." What matters to Nieto is having his vision restored. "If I can see again," he said, a smile creasing his face. "Now that, that would be something."

Settling of Crisis Makes Winners of Andes Nations, While Rebels Lose Ground

By SIMON ROMERO

After leaders in the Andes tiptoed from the edge of war to bear hugs and oaths of brotherhood, Latin America was trying to sort out the winners and losers in the region’s worst diplomatic dispute in years.

A day after the crisis was resolved at a summit meeting in the Dominican Republic on Friday, it was already clear that nearly all of the players lost something. The leaders of Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela traded charges that muddied each of them. Colombia and its ally, the United States, found themselves isolated in the region.

And Latin America’s largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, lost two senior commanders in a week, the latest in a string of tactical and strategic defeats.

But the biggest winner appears to have been the region itself, which resolved its own dispute without outside help and without violence.

The crisis began when Colombian security forces hunted down and killed Raúl Reyes, the FARC’s second-in-command, and 23 others in a raid last weekend on the guerrillas’ camp in Ecuador. Venezuela and Ecuador assailed Colombia as having violated Ecuador’s sovereignty, cut diplomatic ties and sent troops to the Colombian border in a show of force, effectively defending the FARC’s nebulous operations in their countries.

Colombia insists it has the right to attack its enemies, but the military response by its neighbors — President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela vowed war if Colombia pursued its fight with the FARC into Venezuela — could allow the FARC to operate with more freedom outside Colombia.

Still, that victory may be small consolation for the FARC, whose very presence in neighboring countries is a reflection of its loss of strength within Colombia, as a brutally successful counterinsurgency has driven it out of territory it once controlled.

Reports emerged on Friday of yet another senior commander of the FARC who had been killed. No cross-border raid was involved. A deserter simply brought the guerrilla’s severed right hand as proof that he had killed his own commander.

The killing of the guerrilla, Manuel Jesus Muñoz, who went by the nom de guerre Ivan Ríos, was extraordinarily macabre even in the annals of Colombia’s four-decade war. Mr. Muñoz, a member of the FARC’s guiding secretariat, was the fifth senior member of group killed in the past year.

Colombia’s government contends that the FARC, which finances itself through cocaine trafficking and abductions for ransom, has seen its ranks fall from 16,000 members at the start of the decade, when the guerrillas had advanced close to the capital, Bogotá, to between 6,000 and 8,000 now.

For Colombia, too, the results were mixed. It found itself diplomatically isolated in the region, its tactics rebuked and President Álvaro Uribe under siege as a too-willing ally of the United States.

The raid was one of the most controversial chapters of Plan Colombia, the American program that has disbursed more than $5 billion in aid to Colombia since the late 1990s. And in carrying out the operation without getting Ecuador’s permission beforehand, Mr. Uribe took a page from the Bush administration’s playbook.

The predawn operation bears remarkable similarities to one carried out in late January by the United States in Pakistan. In that case, the Central Intelligence Agency used a Predator drone aircraft to drop missiles, killing Abu Laith al-Libi, a senior commander of Al Qaeda who had hidden from American officials for years.

Both operations used local informants to track the men down. Both operations were carried out in foreign countries without getting permission beforehand. Both were tactical victories, killing enemies classified as terrorists.

But in killing Mr. Reyes in Ecuador, Mr. Uribe may have misjudged the reaction that would follow. A firestorm of criticism was directed at Colombia, a nation increasingly viewed as a redoubt of loyalty to the United States in a region chafing at Washington’s waning influence.

“The Bush doctrine openly rejects nonintervention in other nations’ affairs, something that runs counter to the ideal of sovereignty that is so precious in Latin America,” said Greg Grandin, a professor of Latin American history at New York University.

The methods employed by Mr. Uribe, whose father was believed to have been killed by guerrillas in the early 1980s, may be hard to swallow in a region that has largely seen its other cold war-era insurgencies vanquished. On Thursday, Nicaragua joined the fray on the side of Venezuela and Ecuador. But the wrath of Colombia’s neighbors is a price Mr. Uribe seems content to pay.

Despite Colombia’s insistence that it acted alone, speculation persists as to whether the technological prowess of the United States was involved in the hunt for Mr. Reyes.

Mr. Chávez emphatically denied reports last week that he had placed a call to Mr. Reyes’s satellite phone; such a call might have allowed intelligence agencies to track the guerrilla down in Sucumbíos, an Amazonian province in Ecuador’s northern frontier.

In their war of words, Mr. Uribe accused his counterparts in Ecuador and Venezuela of having financial ties to the FARC, a group resembling a criminal syndicate that dresses up its actions in leftist rhetoric.

And the presidents of Ecuador and Venezuela reminded Latin America of the ties between many of Mr. Uribe’s top supporters in Colombia and the paramilitary death squads that have evolved into nothing less than criminal syndicates trafficking in cocaine.

Cocaine, guns, private armies and guerrillas remain the ingredients of Colombia’s war even as the last element is being visibly pushed into the porous border regions of the country’s neighbors.

In the end, Latin America eased its own crisis. But the celebratory behavior of its leaders in the Dominican Republic belies the tension that persists around a war without closure. Just because the FARC is weakened does not mean it will wither away.

Latin American Crisis Resolved

Colombia Apologizes At Regional Summit

By Juan Forero
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, March 8, 2008; A09

BOGOTA, Colombia, March 7 -- The presidents of Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela on Friday agreed to end a bitter standoff that had resulted in troop deployments, a downturn in trade and a rupture in diplomatic relations.

The crisis began after Colombia bombed a rebel camp last Saturday just inside Ecuador, killing 24 guerrillas, including Luis Edgar Devia, a top commander. The strike marked the first time the army had killed a member of the directorate of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, a guerrilla group that has been fighting here for 44 years.

Colombian President Álvaro Uribe had come under criticism from various Latin American governments for the incursion, but at a regional summit in the Dominican Republic on Friday he heartily shook hands with Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. All three of those nations had broken relations with Colombia over the incident.

The resolution of the crisis, at a meeting of the 20-nation Rio Group, came in the form of a declaration that noted Uribe had apologized for the raid and that he promised never to violate another nation's border. "With the apology and the promise of never again violating a brother country, we have overcome this very grave crisis," said Correa, in comments that were broadcast live across much of Latin America.

Although the meeting ended on a positive note, the most serious issue raised in the debate -- that Colombian rebels operate with the help of foreign governments -- has not been resolved and is sure to fester.

The news came soon after the Defense Ministry in Bogota reported the death of a second member of the FARC's top command. Manuel Jesús Muñoz, better known by his nom de guerre, Iván Ríos, did not die in battle, but rather was killed by his own men this week in a mountainous, coffee-growing region of north-central Colombia, Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos told reporters.

The slaying appeared to reflect serious internal divisions in an organization that has in recent months seen several seasoned, mid-level commanders killed in combat and hundreds more desert.

Colombian officials said that Muñoz's men, tired of running from troops, decided to kill him. Santos said they then severed his hand and presented it, along with Muñoz's identification card and computer, to an army column that had been pursuing the guerrillas. The United States had placed a $5 million bounty on Muñoz's head, accusing him of coordinating drug-trafficking operations.

The issue of Colombian guerrillas and whether they are harbored by Venezuela and Ecuador marked the often heated exchanges at Friday's summit, which had been scheduled previously. Ecuador, Venezuela and Nicaragua focused on Colombia's violation of Ecuador's sovereignty, while Colombia said that its people are under threat from rebels hiding outside its borders.

Uribe came out firing, accusing Correa of ties to the FARC. He cited as evidence a letter culled from a computer that commandos recovered in the camp that belonged to Devia. Uribe said the letter showed that the FARC supported Correa during his 2006 presidential campaign.

Correa, a leftist, U.S.-trained economist, angrily rejected the allegations, accused Uribe of lying and explained that his government has battled against FARC units in Ecuador's northern jungles.

"How hard it is to believe something from someone who has lied so many times," Correa said. "My hands are clean, and free of blood."

Other presidents at the summit applauded the Ecuadoran leader, who along with Chávez had vowed to marshal international condemnation for Colombia's incursion.

Chávez, who had been accused this week of assisting the FARC, also denied any ties. "I have never done it and will never do it," he said. "I could have sent a lot of rifles to the FARC. I will never do it because I want peace."

Uribe, though, said his country had been attacked 40 times since 2004 by Colombian rebels who used Ecuador as a launching pad. He also explained why he didn't inform Correa of the strike against Devia, who had been located with the help of a rebel who deserted, military officials said.

"I didn't inform him of the operation because we have not received cooperation from his government in the fight against terrorism," Uribe said.

Tensions eased after Dominican President Leonel Fernández, the host of the summit, appealed for calm and said, "What all of us would like is for this meeting to end with a hug, a handshake, between the presidents of Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador."

With the hearty handshakes, the countries resumed normal diplomatic and commercial relations. Uribe also said that he would not file a complaint with the International Criminal Court accusing Chávez of aiding the FARC, as he had vowed earlier.

Colombians back president

A poll shows Uribe's popularity has climbed since the raid in Ecuador. Many slam Hugo Chavez instead.
By Chris Kraul
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

March 7, 2008

BOGOTA, COLOMBIA — Even at a rally where the placards, chants and speeches carried a distinctly anti-government flavor, Colombians on Thursday backed President Alvaro Uribe after his soldiers' risky incursion into Ecuador to kill a leftist rebel leader.

The incursion Saturday brought reproval from the Organization of American States and prompted neighbors Ecuador and Venezuela to mass troops at their borders and cut diplomatic ties. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez unleashed a torrent of invective, describing Uribe as a mafioso and a U.S. lackey.

"Chavez shouldn't talk in such a vulgar way about our president. That hurts us," said Marina Narvaez, who said she attended the rally because she had survived being forced off her land by paramilitaries in Cordoba state.

Accountant Rafael Escobar said Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa "is not helping things" by touring Latin America to denounce Colombia after the incursion, which killed Raul Reyes, the No. 2 leader in the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the country's largest rebel group. "Leaders should talk among themselves to resolve things."

On a side street just off the central Plaza Bolivar, Vilma Paniza, a department store customer service representative, hurried back to work from the noon rally. "Chavez has a bad attitude," she said. "He wants to dominate us and everyone else and he's not going to."

Planned long before the region's crisis erupted, the rally was organized to underscore the government's role in decades of violence and misery, to remind Colombians that it was not all the fault of rebel groups like the FARC.

But most marchers couldn't bring themselves to knock Uribe for having brought Colombia to its most serious diplomatic standoff in decades.

Their mood is indicative of a public that has rallied behind Uribe, even as Venezuelan and Ecuadorean troops have gathered at the border, those neighbors -- joined by Nicaragua on Thursday -- have broken diplomatic ties and Chavez has threatened to hurt Colombia by freezing trade and using other tactics.

A poll conducted in four cities this week showed Uribe's popularity has climbed since the raid to an 83% approval rating. Although the poll was commissioned by the government, it still reflects popular sentiment, said Cesar Caballero, head of the independent polling firm Concepts and Figures in Bogota.

"First, there is a tremendous solidarity behind Uribe for the gross language Chavez has used toward him," Caballero said. "Also, there is a growing outrage against the FARC for its brutality, kidnappings and extortions, which the government uses at every opportunity in its favor."

Even opinion makers such as magazine columnist Daniel Coronell, who often take an anti-Uribe stance, have lined up behind the president. "The intrusion of the government of Venezuela is a hugely disturbing factor that blocks the path to a resolution."

Nearly all those interviewed at the rally saw the chance of war as remote, despite Chavez's statements and Venezuela's having sent 9,000 troops to its border, along with tanks and aircraft. Ecuador deployed 3,200 troops, and a government spokeswoman announced Thursday that its army had captured five suspected Colombian guerrillas on its side of the line. Colombia has sent no extra troops as yet.

"It's just talk," said Alejandro Alvarez, a lawyer from the eastern city of Arauca. "There is a conflict, but it's a political and diplomatic conflict that won't reach physical war. Chavez can send all the troops he wants. But it's another thing to fire shots."

In Managua, Nicaragua, President Daniel Ortega, with Correa at his side, announced that he was cutting diplomatic relations with Colombia.

It was during Correa's visit the night before in Venezuela that Chavez warned not only of a possible nationalization of Colombian companies, but also that trade between the two countries, which last year totaled $5 billion, would be reduced.

Chavez has sealed off most border crossings with Colombia, allowing cars and pedestrians but keeping out all but perishable cargo.

Analysts said a prolonged reduction in Colombian imports, which represent a significant portion of Venezuela's daily foodstuffs, might compound Chavez's domestic problems.

Venezuela is already suffering from widespread food shortages and double-digit inflation, largely as a result of socialist policies that have cut domestic production.

The threats came a day after the Organization of American States passed a resolution criticizing Colombia's incursion one mile into Ecuador. Although Colombia apologized and Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Maria Isabel Salvador expressed her satisfaction with the vote, Correa on Thursday said it was unacceptable and demanded the OAS issue a more formal condemnation.

Also in Ecuador, authorities said two Mexican citizens may have died along with Reyes. University students from Mexico were visiting Quito, the Ecuadorean capital, at the time, and some were thought to have visited the rebel camp where Reyes was. One female student was injured in the attack, but Mexico's Foreign Relations Ministry said Thursday that no deaths had been confirmed

Ecuadorean Defense Minister Wellington Sandoval, reacting to reports that U.S. intelligence helped locate Reyes, told a radio reporter that Colombia must have received help via "technology that Latin America does not have." He said the bombs that killed Reyes all dropped within a 50-meter radius and seemed to be "smart bombs."

Colombia's Defense Ministry said Wednesday that Reyes was located through a tip from a "demobilized" guerrilla.

U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Thursday requested a hearing or a classified session with senior Colombian officials to review information obtained from three laptop computers recovered in the jungle camp where Reyes was killed.

Colombian authorities said this week that the information includes documents indicating the FARC received $300 million from Chavez and that the rebels were seeking to acquire uranium, possibly for a weapon.

chris.kraul@latimes.com

Special correspondents Paul Rosero in Quito and Jenny Carolina Gonzalez in Bogota and Cecilia Sánchez of The Times' Mexico City Bureau contributed to this report.

Colombian Rebels' Ties to Chávez Come Into Focus

Computer Files Found In Raid Detail Efforts To Gain Arms, Money

By Juan Forero
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, March 7, 2008; A11

BOGOTA, Colombia, March 6 -- A trove of correspondence recovered during a raid on a guerrilla camp is providing a rare window into how Colombia's largest rebel group has drawn closer to Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in an effort to acquire money, arms and the political recognition the organization craves.

If authentic, the documents would make clear for the first time that Chávez's affinity for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, has translated into more than rhetoric on its behalf.

The documents were discovered Saturday on three laptop computers and two hard drives after Colombian forces bombed a rebel camp 2,000 feet inside Ecuador, killing 24 guerrillas, including Luis Edgar Devia, a member of the FARC's ruling secretariat who used the name Raúl Reyes.

The correspondence appears to show that Venezuelan officials are eager to work with rebel commanders to isolate Colombian President Álvaro Uribe, an ally of the Bush administration. The documents also include letters to Chávez from FARC leader Manuel Marulanda.

There are no missives from Chávez, however, and on Wednesday the Venezuelan president called Colombia's characterization of his ties to the FARC a lie.

"I deny it. I have to deny it as absolutely false," he said.

The e-mails and letters that form the brunt of the correspondence recount meetings with Chávez, top Venezuelan intelligence officials and other emissaries sent by the government in Caracas to convene secretly with FARC commanders. Colombia's National Police released 15 documents culled from the computers and hard drives this week. Another 30 documents, provided on two CDs to The Washington Post by senior government officials, paint a fuller picture of the rebels' ties with Chávez.

"What's important is for your government and the FARC to have ample relations as friends and good neighbors for the future of our two people," Marulanda said in a letter dated Sept. 22.

Full of Colombian slang and revolutionary lingo, the documents appear to be briefing papers that analyze the FARC's relationship with Chávez and discuss options available to the guerrilla group. They suggest that commanders see a clear benefit to building a relationship with the Venezuelan leader. Many letters are signed by Devia, who was the group's public face.

The chief of Colombia's National Police, Brig. Gen. Óscar Naranjo, said the government has asked a team from Interpol to examine the laptops and hard drives to confirm that they belonged to FARC commanders. That multinational team is to work in Bogota on Tuesday.

"We have nothing to hide," Naranjo said by phone Thursday afternoon. "We're entirely open to any technical review."

The raid on the camp has triggered a regional crisis, with Ecuador, Venezuela and now Nicaragua -- a close ally of Chávez's government -- breaking off relations with Colombia. The Colombian government has responded with an aggressive diplomatic offensive in Latin America and Europe to highlight what officials often have said privately but are now saying publicly -- that Chávez supports a terrorist group that has killed thousands of Colombians.

"What's true is we're going to use all the political and judicial resources on a situation we consider grave, the support of President Chávez to the Colombian guerrillas," Vice President Francisco Santos said Thursday during a trip to Brussels, according to the Reuters news service. "It's a clear support, a support that's in clear evidence in the documents pulled from Raúl Reyes's computer."

In several letters, FARC commanders discuss funding received from Venezuela, both in cash and through partnerships in which the rebels would sell gasoline in Colombia and launder money in Venezuela. There are also messages about a drug-trafficking deal, though they do not implicate Venezuelan officials, and talk of the acquisition of armaments.

"We're talking arms and money, gasoline and political space," said one intelligence official who is sifting through the material and who spoke on condition of anonymity.

FARC commanders refer to "300" they are to receive from Venezuela -- which intelligence officials here believe signifies $300 million. The commanders do not elaborate on what "300" means, but there are missives in which they discuss ensuring that it makes it into their hands safely.

The man overseeing the operation, according to the documents, is "Angel," who Colombian authorities believe is Chávez.

"A bird in your hand is worth more than 100 in the air, say those who know the business," Devia wrote in late 2007. Jorge Briceño, considered the FARC's top military strategist, asked in a Jan. 14 note to other commanders, "Who, where, when and how will we receive the dollars and store them?"

In another letter, addressed to the rest of the FARC secretariat, Devia reports that a leading Colombian senator has received money for social programs in Colombia. "If that's correct, we can't dismiss getting ourselves 250 million for the Plan," he said, referring to the group's efforts to isolate the Uribe government and strengthen rebel forces.

The Colombian strike against the FARC has outraged Chávez, who has called it "a war crime," while raising the specter of war with Uribe's government.

In recent weeks, Chávez has drawn closer to the FARC and more antagonistic toward Uribe's government and its benefactor, the United States. Colombia's government characterizes the FARC as little more than a murderous band of drug traffickers, though the group retains some support in rural hamlets where the state has almost no presence. The United States and Europe have listed the group as a terrorist organization.

In January, to rousing approval in Venezuela's Congress, Chávez said the FARC was not a terrorist group but an insurgent force that had a "project that is respected here." The FARC's stated goal, well-known to most Colombians and also made clear in several of the recovered documents, is to topple Uribe's government.

Chávez has met in Caracas with Iván Márquez, another member of the FARC's inner circle, and other guerrillas to negotiate the release of six Colombian hostages. He has recently been working to liberate others.

In the documents, the guerrillas see Chávez's involvement as benefiting their cause of being removed from international lists of terrorist groups. "He wins for his geopolitical objectives, and we, without a doubt, will win recognition as a belligerent force," Marulanda told other commanders on Sept. 22.

FARC commanders also see an alliance with Chávez as crucial to the strengthening of their military position and the possibility of "consolidating" along the loosely patrolled, 1,300-mile border between the two countries. "He's permitting us to advance together on the Bolivarian project," Briceño, the military strategist, told the secretariat in a Nov. 22 note, referring to Chávez's self-styled revolution.

Much of the correspondence deals with the so-called humanitarian accord, swapping four dozen high-profile hostages for hundreds of FARC members held in Colombian jails. In the correspondence, FARC commanders discuss Chávez's proposals to win the release of hostages, as well as a plan to move the hostages and 500 jailed guerrillas to Venezuela. The documents show Chávez as eager to meet with guerrillas and win the release of hostages.

"He also asked about Ingrid," Márquez said to the secretariat Dec. 23, referring to Ingrid Betancourt, the best-known hostage. "But we told him that if we did that, we'd be left without any chips."

In the documents, particularly in letters to Chávez, the guerrillas praise the Venezuelan president's rule and frequently appear to address many of the issues he considers important. Foremost is opposing capitalism and U.S. influence in Colombia.

In his Sept. 22 letter to Chávez, Marulanda said the United States has a 3,000-man military contingent in Colombia.

"What do you think of that, Mr. President?" he asked.

Staff writer Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.

Heated Words in Wake of Colombian Raid

Ecuador's Correa Warns of Danger to Region; Uribe to Seek Genocide Charges Against Chávez

By Monte Reel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, March 5, 2008; A15

RECIFE, Brazil, March 4 -- While troops in Ecuador and Venezuela moved toward their borders with Colombia, the leaders of those three countries moved further from a negotiated solution Tuesday. One ratcheted up his rhetoric, another cut trade ties, and the third warned of a broader regional conflict if the worsening diplomatic dispute becomes a military confrontation.

Ecuador's Rafael Correa visited Peru to begin a tour soliciting Latin American backing for sanctions against Colombia after its military crossed into Ecuador on Saturday to attack guerrillas from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, who use the frontier region as a sanctuary. Venezuela, which jumped into the dispute in support of Ecuador, announced that it would halt cross-border trade with Colombia.

"If this act goes unpunished, the whole region will be in danger, because the next victim could be Peru, it could be Brazil, it could be Venezuela, Bolivia or any of our countries," Correa said in televised comments in Lima. "Colombia's attitude is creating a danger for the entire region and setting intolerable precedents."

But Colombia's Álvaro Uribe announced that he will ask the International Criminal Court to bring genocide charges against Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, whom he has accused of sympathizing with the rebel group. Colombian officials contend that computer documents recovered in Saturday's cross-border raid revealed that Chávez had given more than $300 million to the FARC, the Marxist insurgency that has battled the Colombian government for more than 40 years.

Correa and Chávez are vocal critics of the regional influence of the United States, which has provided military assistance and billions of dollars in funding for Colombia's fight against drug-trafficking and guerrilla groups that profit from the narcotics trade. President Bush said Tuesday that he spoke with Uribe to express his support.

"I told the president that America fully supports Colombia's democracy and that we firmly oppose any acts of aggression that could destabilize the region," Bush said at the White House. "I told him that America will continue to stand with Colombia as it confronts violence and terror and fights drug traffickers."

Though the initial dispute did not involve Venezuela, Chávez's involvement surprised no one in the region. A former army lieutenant colonel who tried unsuccessfully to topple the Venezuelan government in 1992, Chávez has infuriated Uribe by publicly praising the FARC and its members as "revolutionaries."

"Certainly one of the points of greatest discord between Venezuela and Colombia has been the overt support of Chávez for the FARC, which resulted in a worsening of diplomatic relations even before March 1," said Peter DeShazo, a former U.S. diplomat in Latin America and currently director of the Americas program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "Generally, Chávez's view on the FARC has been largely benign in the face of a Colombian government that has dedicated itself to encountering the FARC and the other illegal armed groups."

In recent months, Chávez has tried to mediate swaps of prisoners between the FARC and the government of Colombia. The FARC has released six hostages to Venezuelan authorities, and Chávez has asked other governments to remove the group from their lists of terrorist organizations.

Among the hostages held by the FARC are three U.S. military contractors and former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, who also has French citizenship. Both France and Ecuador had been communicating with Raúl Reyes, a senior FARC commander killed in Saturday's raid, according to Colombian officials.

The FARC released a statement Tuesday saying that Reyes was killed while trying to arrange -- through Chávez -- a meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy to discuss the possible release of Betancourt, who is said to be ill. Correa contended during his televised address that Colombia's attack disrupted late-stage discussions to release 12 hostages.

During an emergency meeting of the Organization of American States in Washington aimed at negotiating a peaceful solution to the crisis, Colombian officials described the FARC as a "mafia" group. But they also reiterated the country's apologies to Ecuador for the incursion into its territory.

"The government of Colombia has offered public apologies to the government of Ecuador, and we do so again today," Camilo Ospina, the Colombian ambassador to the OAS, said during the televised meeting.

Neighbors take aim at Colombia over incursion

Latin American nations criticize Bogota for killing a FARC rebel leader in Ecuador, moving the region toward crisis.
By Chris Kraul and Patrick J. McDonnell
Los Angeles Times Staff Writers

March 5, 2008

BOGOTA, COLOMBIA — An increasingly isolated Colombia came under heavy criticism from its neighbors at an emergency Organization of American States session Tuesday for killing a top Colombian rebel leader in Ecuador last weekend.

A sense of crisis has enveloped the region as diplomats worked to avoid an armed conflict that could be devastating to a continent that has successfully transitioned into a mostly democratic region after the military juntas and "dirty wars" of the 1970s and 1980s.

Virtually all South American nations, though urging patience, have denounced the cross-border attack that killed Raul Reyes, the No. 2 commander of the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe leveled allegations of his own, saying he would bring charges of state-sponsored terrorism against leftist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez at the International Criminal Court, citing evidence from the dead rebel's laptop computer that Chavez gave $300 million and other resources to the FARC.

Venezuela, meanwhile, made a move that could halt billions of dollars worth of trade. According to the mayor's office in the Colombian border town of Cucuta, Chavez closed the frontier to cargo, although some trucks with perishable goods were allowed to cross.

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa, before departing on a five-nation tour to rally support, said the killing of the rebel leader, whose real name was Luis Edgar Devia Silva, may have ruined chances for the release of 12 hostages held by his rebel group, including former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt.

At the OAS, Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Maria Isabel Salvador said that Colombia's apology for the incursion was insufficient and that the organization should send a special commission to investigate.

Though they may side with Uribe in his fight against the FARC, many Latin American nations have their own territorial disputes and see upholding sovereignty as in their interest.

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, a moderate socialist and a firm U.S. ally, was among the leaders who stressed the importance of borders and the need to respect them. A border war between Argentina and Chile was averted in the 1970s through papal intervention.

Peruvian President Alan Garcia, another firm U.S. partner and avowed enemy of Chavez, this week conditionally condemned the action by the Colombian military.

"If a military incursion would have happened in Peru, it would have been unacceptable," he said.

One of Colombia's few backers at the OAS meeting was acting U.S. representative J. Robert Manzanares, who said the Colombian troops ordered into Ecuador had a right to "pursue this terrorist menace."

President Bush also weighed in. Before the session began, he read a statement to reporters in which he touted a proposed free-trade agreement with Colombia, saying it would counter "those seeking to undermine democracy."

Venezuela and Ecuador earlier sent troops to their borders with Colombia, recalled their ambassadors and expelled Colombia's. The government in Bogota has so far refused to respond in kind.

But Chavez faced mounting criticism at home for involving Venezuela in a tiff that many Venezuelans see as none of his business. A former defense minister, retired Gen. Raul Baduel, told reporters in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, that deploying troops to the Colombian border was "confused."

"This is a desperate attempt by President Chavez to use the military for political and personal ends, making them participants in an action whose consequences could be disastrous," said Baduel, a former Chavez confidant turned critic.

Tensions have been building since Colombia revealed Saturday morning that it killed Reyes and 16 other guerrillas in an operation Uribe said started in Colombia and spilled over into Ecuador.

Correa said Uribe lied to him in justifying the incursion as a matter of hot pursuit. Chavez, meanwhile, described Colombia as the region's militaristic "new Israel" and threatened war if troops entered Venezuela.

Colombian OAS representative Camilo Ospina repeated his country's earlier apology to Ecuador. But he quickly went on the offensive, charging Ecuador and Venezuela with openly harboring and supporting the FARC. He said the assertion was bolstered by contents of the rebels' laptop computers, which among other things indicated that Reyes had met with Ecuadorean Interior Minister Gustavo Larrea.

"It was not an area of transit but a permanent camp" that Colombia attacked, Ospina said. He mocked Larrea's explanation that his meetings with Reyes had a "humanitarian purpose." Larrea should have turned Reyes over to Interpol, Ospina said.

A U.S. intelligence official in Washington said he could not confirm reports that American spies had tipped off the Colombian authorities that Reyes was using a satellite telephone that allowed him to be tracked.

The official acknowledged, however, that U.S. officials have such capabilities and that they share information with allies such as Colombia.

U.S. officials played down the possibility that the developments could touch off a war in the Andes.

"People are pretty much focused on the diplomatic track, and I don't think anyone expects it will lead to anything else," said a senior State Department official.

chris.kraul@latimes.com

patrick.mcdonnell @latimes.com

Kraul reported from Bogota and McDonnell from Buenos Aires. Times staff writer Paul Richter in Washington and special correspondent Mery Mogollon in Caracas contributed to this report.

Colombia Says Rebels Sought to Make Dirty Bomb

By SIMON ROMERO

CARACAS, Venezuela — Colombia added a new accusation against the FARC rebel group on Tuesday, saying Colombian forces had found evidence that the rebels had been seeking the ingredients to make a radioactive dirty bomb.

The accusation, made by Colombia’s vice president, Francisco Santos, at a United Nations disarmament meeting in Geneva, represents a sharp verbal escalation surrounding the three-country dispute involving Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador. The quarrel began over the weekend when Colombian forces hunted down and killed a Colombian guerrilla leader on Ecuadorean soil.

Material found on a laptop computer recovered in that raid provided the basis for Mr. Santos’s accusations about a dirty bomb, a weapon that combines highly radioactive material with conventional explosives to disperse deadly dust that people would inhale.

“This shows that these terrorist groups, supported by the economic power provided by drug trafficking, constitute a grave threat not just to our country but to the entire Andean region and Latin America," Mr. Santos said in a statement that was posted in Spanish on the disarmament conference’s web site. The rebels were “negotiating to get radioactive material, the primary base for making dirty weapons of destruction and terrorism,” he said.

It was unclear from Mr. Santos’s statement whom the rebels were negotiating with.

Mr. Santos based his claim on information provided Monday in Bogotá by Colombia’s national police chief about a deal involving the FARC’s negotiations for 110 pounds of uranium.

The tension further escalated when President Álvaro Uribe of Colombia said Tuesday that he would file a complaint with the International Criminal Court against President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, accusing him of providing financial assistance to the FARC, which stands for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, Colombia’s largest rebel group.

In another reaction to Colombia’s cross-border raid, Elías Jaua, Venezuela’s agriculture minister, said that Venezuela was planning to close its border with Colombia to halt commercial trade.

On Monday, Ecuador broke off diplomatic relations with Colombia, and Venezuela expelled Colombia’s ambassador and other diplomats.

The three countries have been swapping accusations of treachery and deceit in the dispute over the killing of the guerrilla leader, Raúl Reyes, by Colombian forces.

The Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, in ordering the expulsion of the Colombian Embassy’s diplomatic personnel, said it was acting “in defense of the sovereignty of the fatherland and the dignity of the Venezuelan people.”

President Rafael Correa of Ecuador, who expelled Colombia’s ambassador over the weekend, went a step further on Monday by breaking off diplomatic relations. The move was not unexpected after his claim that Mr. Uribe of Colombia was lying about the nature of the raid.

Venezuela and Ecuador sent troops to the Colombian border on Sunday in response to Colombia’s military raid on the rebel encampment in the jungle about a mile inside Ecuador. Colombian forces killed 21 guerrillas in the FARC.

In addition to killing Mr. Reyes, Colombia said it had recovered his laptop computer. Its contents have since been at the center of several allegations.

At a news conference in Bogotá, Gen. Oscar Naranjo, Colombia’s police chief, accused Venezuela of channeling $300 million to the FARC, based on what he said was information obtained from Mr. Reyes’s computer.

General Naranjo also said computer documents showed financial support from the FARC for Mr. Chávez of Venezuela, going back to the time Mr. Chávez spent in prison after an unsuccessful coup attempt in Caracas in 1992.

“This implies more than cozying up, but an armed alliance between the FARC and the Venezuelan government,” General Naranjo said.

Venezuela’s government, which sent tank units to its border with Colombia in a response to the Colombian raid, denied aiding the rebels. “We are used to the Colombian government’s lies,” Vice President Ramón Carrizales said.

General Naranjo displayed photographs and documents he said had been taken from Mr. Reyes’s computer, but the context of the information was unclear.

Ecuador also rejected claims by Colombia of ties with the FARC, and sent 3,200 troops to Sucumbios, an Amazonian province near its border with Colombia where the attack on the FARC’s camp took place.

Mr. Correa, the Ecuadorean president, said the Colombian rebels had been killed in their sleep “in their pajamas,” and not in the heat of pursuit as Colombia’s security forces had said. Ecuadorean emergency officials recovered several wounded members of the FARC, transporting them to hospitals in Quito.

Faced with one of Latin America’s worst diplomatic crises in recent years, the Organization of American States said it would convene a meeting in Washington on Tuesday to try to prevent an escalation of the dispute between Colombia, a staunch Bush administration ally, and the leftist governments of Ecuador and Venezuela.

Even as Colombia’s government offered details on the FARC’s relations with Venezuela and Ecuador, Colombian officials said Monday that they would not send more troops to the borders with the two countries in response to the mobilizations ordered by Mr. Chávez and Mr. Correa.

Because of the FARC’s resilient history at the heart of Colombia’s war, it has had contact with insurgencies and governments throughout Latin America and beyond, including the United States, which classifies the FARC and other armed groups in Colombia as terrorists.

For instance, in 1998 a Clinton administration official, Philip T. Chicola, then the State Department’s director of Andean affairs, had a clandestine meeting with Mr. Reyes in Costa Rica in an effort to establish a way of communicating with the FARC during times of crisis.

The meeting was described in a diplomatic cable written by Mr. Chicola in January 1999 and declassified in 2004. Also present at the meeting was Mr. Reyes’s wife, Olga Marín, who is believed to be the daughter of the FARC’s top commander, Manuel Marulanda, and also reported to be present, and possibly wounded, in the raid on the jungle camp on Saturday.

The Bush administration on Monday reiterated its support for Colombia’s struggle against the FARC and cocaine trafficking, but called for a negotiated solution to the crisis.

“This, for us, is an issue between the governments of Colombia and Ecuador,” said Tom H. Casey, deputy spokesman at the State Department, in a briefing to reporters on Monday in Washington. “We believe it’s appropriate for them to work that out through diplomatic discussion.”

Still, what began over the weekend as an operation by Colombian forces in Ecuadorean territory has evolved into a wider regional matter.

“Our view of this issue right now is that there is no doubt that there is a territorial violation and we condemn it,” said Celso Amorim, Brazil’s foreign minister, speaking to reporters in Brasília. “It raises insecurity problems in all countries of the region, mostly in the smaller ones.”

And amid the Colombian accusations, Mr. Chávez remains at the center of the increasing tension, with his political opponents here criticizing his decision to mobilize troops and fighter jets in a show of Venezuelan force.

“If anyone has to protest, it is Ecuador’s government, as the military incident took place in Ecuadorean territory, not ours,” Teodoro Petkoff, the publisher of the newspaper Tal Cual, said in an editorial. “Venezuela has nothing to complain about.”

Jenny Carolina González contributed reporting from Bogotá, Colombia, and Uta Harnischfeger from Zurich.

Border incursion was Colombian gamble

Tensions continue to mount over the killing of a FARC rebel in Ecuador, but for Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, it was a calculated risk.
By Chris Kraul
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

March 4, 2008

BOGOTA, COLOMBIA — President Alvaro Uribe appears to have taken a calculated risk in ordering his armed forces to invade Ecuador to kill a top rebel leader, deciding to risk the ire of his southern neighbor to inflict a major loss in a decades-long war.

Tensions continued to mount Monday after the clandestine operation in which Colombian soldiers and aircraft entered Ecuador to kill Raul Reyes, the nom de guerre of the No. 2 commander in Colombia's largest rebel group, known by its Spanish initials, FARC.

Venezuelan and Ecuadorean troops are massing at Colombia's borders. Uribe faces a scolding at a special meeting of the Organization of American States today, and his neighbors have recalled their ambassadors and expelled his. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is threatening war if Colombian forces cross his border.

All in all, it's a grim situation in a region where good relations have long been the norm. Tensions haven't been this high since 1987, when Colombia sent a naval vessel to Venezuela's Gulf of Maracaibo to stake a short-lived claim to an offshore island.

But experts say Uribe decided that the opportunity to kill Reyes was worth the diplomatic storm, figuring that immigration and economic ties among neighbors, in addition to aversion to war, would stave off anything worse.

"The operation was planned and the risks were studied," said Camilo Gonzalez of Indepaz, a peace advocacy think tank in Bogota. "In the end, Uribe decided to get his military success and assume the cost of a diplomatic incident."

Bruce Bagley, a political scientist at the University of Miami and a Colombia specialist, said Uribe was exasperated by his neighbors' unwillingness to do anything about the FARC's presence on their territory. Uribe gambled because he was "desperate for major kills" and because the chance of war breaking out along either border is small.

"Although you can never discount a mistake leading to a shooting war," none of the three countries can afford to risk the billions in trade between them, Bagley said. "But I foresee weeks and months of tension and a military buildup on all sides."

In Colombia, Uribe's gamble adds to his popularity, which in recent polls already exceeded 80%. Few here mourn the loss of Reyes, 59, who as the public face of the FARC embodied the killings, extortion and kidnappings the rebels have inflicted on Colombians for decades.

In Venezuela, there were signs that Chavez's call to arms was falling on unreceptive ears. Several opposition politicians and retired generals questioned the need for a mobilization. Others charged that Chavez wanted war to distract Venezuelans from rising inflation and scarcity of food items.

"Most Venezuelans are against the Colombian guerrillas," said political analyst Anibal Romero in a telephone interview from Caracas. "We have nothing in common with them, we don't like them and there is no reason for us to support Chavez in his support of them."

Colombian officials say the predawn raid Saturday began on their side of the border. But after troops and aircraft allegedly drew fire from FARC rebels in a camp on the other side of the Putumayo River, Colombian forces entered a mile deep into Ecuador in "hot pursuit."

Reyes and 16 other guerrillas were killed.

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa's initial reaction was muted.

But on Sunday night he lashed out, saying Uribe had lied to him about what happened.

By then, Ecuadorean military experts had visited the site and determined that at least some of the guerrillas were killed as they slept.

In a televised address to the nation, Correa said the mission was a "planned air attack" two miles inside Ecuador "in plain consciousness that they were violating our sovereignty."

Ecuador will ask the OAS today to denounce Colombia's incursion. A State Department spokeswoman declined to say how interim U.S. representative Robert Manzanares would vote on the measure. But Colombia will make a charge of its own, that Chavez and Correa support the FARC rebels, and will ask the OAS to authorize a special commission to investigate the alleged links.

Among Colombia's evidence are three laptop computers seized in Reyes' jungle camp.

Colombian police said they contained a trove of information on the close relations between the leftist FARC guerrillas and the Ecuadorean and Venezuelan governments.

Files alleged to have been stored in the computers were released here Monday. The files include information on a $300-million payment Chavez allegedly made to the FARC and a promise from FARC leader Manuel Marulanda to help defend Venezuela in the event of American aggression, police commander Gen. Oscar Naranjo said at a news conference.

On Sunday, Colombia said Reyes' computer files indicated that Ecuador accommodates the presence of the rebels by stationing "non-hostile" police and army units in the zone where they camp.

Files also documented meetings between Ecuadorean Interior Minister Gustavo Larrea and Reyes, the Colombians charged.

Larrea acknowledged Monday that he met with Reyes in January in an unspecified third country to discuss the release of hostages held by the FARC.

chris.kraul@latimes.com

Colombia: Latin America tries to defuse escalating crisis

Colombian President Álvaro Uribe said Tuesday that his government would ask the International Criminal Court to try Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez for financing and supporting Colombia's main rebel group.
By Sara Miller Llana | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
and Sibylla Brodzinsky | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

Mexico City and Bogota, Colombia

Latin American countries are rushing to defuse the region's worst diplomatic crisis in years after Ecuador and Venezuela cut ties with Colombia, deployed troops to the borders, and issued warnings of war in the wake of Colombia's airstrike Saturday on leftist rebels based in neighboring Ecuador.

The Organization of American States (OAS) moved to hold an emergency meeting Tuesday to press for a peaceful solution, but in the current heated atmosphere, some experts expect the issue to move quickly to the United Nations Security Council.

Colombia's President Álvaro Uribe accused Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on Tuesday of "sponsoring and financing genocide" after Colombian officials said Saturday's raid turned up evidence that Mr. Chávez paid $300 million to support the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebel group.

While most observers consider full-scale war unlikely, they warn that the bluster and saber rattling could ruin efforts to climb down from the current crisis.

"Rhetoric, when it reaches a certain level, is in and of itself a concern," says Peter DeShazo, the director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "To move things in a positive direction [the countries must] stop the verbal confrontations."

Colombia initially apologized for Saturday's incursion that killed a senior FARC leader, Raul Reyes, but then claimed Monday that documents found on computers seized in the raid showed that Chávez had funded the guerrillas and that Ecuador's leftist leader Rafael Correa (a Chávez ally) had sent a minister to meet with the rebels. Colombian police also say they found evidence that the FARC had been trying to get radioactive material for dirty bombs. Ecuador and Venezuela deny the allegations.

Ecuador marshals regional support

Mr. Correa arrived in Peru on Tuesday to start a five-nation tour of the region to lobby for support against what he calls a premeditated violation of his country's sovereignty.

"This is not a bilateral problem, it's a regional problem," he said. "Should this set a precedent, Latin America will become another Middle East."

Ecuador will seek a resolution at the OAS condemning Colombia for violating its territory, says Vicente Torrijos, an international relations expert in Bogotá. Colombia, he says, will defend itself on the basis of a UN antiterrorism resolution that prohibits states from "providing any form of support, active or passive, to entities or persons involved in terrorist acts."

Mr. Uribe reportedly spent the day Monday on the phone with regional leaders explaining his country's position. Colombia is expected to present further evidence of Venezuela and Ecuador's alleged support of the FARC at the OAS meeting.

Mr. Torrijos sees the conflict eventually being taken up by the UN Security Council and even envisions sanctions on Venezuela and Ecuador under the antiterrorism resolution.

Carlos Luna, a foreign affairs expert at the Central University of Venezuela in Caracas, says that the nations must work hard not to internationalize the conflict. "Siding of countries along ideological lines could cause lasting effects on the region," he says.

Ideology behind the tensions

But politics has driven much of the current meltdown. Chávez, who on his Sunday radio program said that it would be a cause for war if Colombia attempted a similar raid on Venezuelan territory, has been criticized for meddling. "The reaction by [Chávez] has been irresponsible in the manner in which he took the incident personally even though it is an issue to resolve between Ecuador and Colombia," says Carlos Romero, a professor of political science at the Central University of Venezuela in Caracas.

Relations between Chávez and Uribe, whom Chávez calls a US pawn, have deteriorated since Chávez attempted to mediate a prisoner swap. Although six hostages have been released to Venezuelan authorities, Chávez was quickly recalled for breaching protocols.

Colombia has been criticized too, for staging the attack without warning Ecuador, and then for the timing of its accusations against Ecuador and Venezuela. "The handling of that evidence has been pretty disastrous," says Gerson Arias, an analyst with the Ideas Para la Paz think tank in Bogotá, adding that Colombia should have held off on presenting the information from the seized computers until the OAS met.

By first apologizing to Ecuador for its incursion into Ecuadorean territory – an apology that Ecuador did not accept – and then revealing the evidence of FARC ties to the media in Bogotá sends "confusing and mixed messages."

Correa said Monday that the strike by Colombia spoiled negotiations his country was pursuing on a hostage swap – putting another dent in bilateral relations. "At the present moment it is very difficult to ease the tension between Colombia and Ecuador," says Adrian Bonilla, a political analyst at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences in Quito.

Still, many expect ties between Ecuador and Colombia to improve quickly. "With Venezuela the breach is much greater, the ideological gap," says Mr. DeShazo. "The confrontation is deeper between Venezuela and Colombia than with Ecuador."

The standoff is stoking nationalist sentiment in Ecuador and Colombia, says Mr. Bonilla. "Most of the people in Ecuador are rejecting the behavior of [Uribe], in every social condition, and from every different ideological base," says Mr. Bonilla. "In the case of Colombia many are supporting their government."

The region has become polarized so quickly, in part, because of each country's weak institutions, says Riordan Roett, director of the Latin American Studies Program at Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School for Advanced International Studies in Washington.

"The processes that would normally work out these problems don't exist," says Mr. Roett. "What would normally have happened, rather than forcing ambassadors to leave, would be dialogue of foreign ministers and special envoys."

In Bogotá, the mood is somber, following the celebratory atmosphere after Saturday's coup against the FARC. And while most Colombians believe a war with their neighbors is improbable, some have little faith in a diplomatic solution.

Javier Cardenas says things may have gone past the point of diplomacy and fears an armed conflict could break out. "Before, it seemed like something far off and impossible. Now it looks like it's something that's possible and very, very close," he said.

• Daniel Cancel contributed from Caracas.

Stress Builds Over Colombia Raid

Regional Leaders Urge Calm; Police Cite Rebel Documents

By Monte Reel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, March 4, 2008; A13

RECIFE, Brazil, March 3 -- More accusations of cross-border meddling intensified diplomatic tensions Monday between Colombia and its neighbors Ecuador and Venezuela, as other Latin American leaders tried to defuse a crisis they fear could threaten regional stability.

Venezuela and Ecuador deployed troops to their borders with Colombia, which on Saturday attacked a jungle encampment in Ecuadoran territory used by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. A senior leader of the Marxist insurgency, which has battled the Colombian government for more than four decades and profits from the drug trade, was killed in the raid.

Ecuador's President Rafael Correa formally cut diplomatic ties with Colombia and has joined Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in denouncing the attack as a violation of his country's sovereignty. Venezuela said later that it would expel the Colombian ambassador and other diplomatic personnel. Regional leaders, including officials in Brazil and Chile, strongly questioned Colombia's military incursion into Ecuador, but urged peaceful negotiations to avert a regional military conflict.

Colombian officials said Monday that they do not plan to send troops to the borders with Venezuela and Ecuador. But they contended that the raid proved their long-held suspicion that Colombian guerrillas have been using neighboring countries as havens from which to attack Colombian forces.

"We are accustomed to the Colombian government's lies," said Ramón Carrizalez, Venezuela's executive vice president. "They can invent whatever they like to try to cover up the violation of Ecuadoran territory."

Gen. Óscar Naranjo, director of Colombia's national police, said computers recovered from the camp revealed numerous links between the rebels and the governments of Ecuador and Venezuela, including evidence of more than $300 million in payments from Chávez to the FARC. Colombia's government, led by U.S. ally Álvaro Uribe, has accused the populist administrations of Chávez and Correa of sympathizing with the FARC's stated cause.

The documents were recovered from three computers, according to Naranjo, and their contents will be analyzed by inspectors from the Organization of American States. He said the documents also contain details of international drug deals and efforts to acquire 50 kilograms of uranium. Naranjo did not provide evidence to back those allegations, but he suggested that the documents should spur other countries to get involved in the crisis.

"This means the FARC is taking big steps in the world of terrorism to become a global aggressor," Naranjo said during a news conference. "This is transnational terrorism."

Leaders throughout Latin America tried Monday to cool the crisis. In Brazil, an adviser to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva told a radio station that the conflict was "beginning to destabilize regional relations." Lula planned to talk with Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner on Monday to coordinate diplomatic efforts, said the adviser, Marco Aurélio Garcia.

"We are mobilizing all of Brazil's diplomatic resources and those of other South American capitals to find a lasting solution," Garcia was quoted as saying.

Chile's President Michelle Bachelet suggested that Colombia has the responsibility to thoroughly explain the decision to attack with airstrikes and ground troops across the Ecuadoran border. The raid killed at least 16 people, including Luis Edgar Devia, a top FARC commander also known as Raúl Reyes.

"A situation of this nature requires an explanation from Colombia to Ecuadorans -- to the president of Ecuador and the entire region," Bachelet said in comments broadcast by TV Chile. "We are very worried."

Though the incident that sparked the crisis did not involve Venezuela, Chávez -- a close ally of Correa's and a frequent critic of Colombia's close relations with the United States -- jumped into the dispute.

Relations between Chávez and Uribe have been particularly tense since Chávez tried to mediate a swap of prisoners between FARC and the Colombian government last year. The FARC has since released six hostages to Venezuelan authorities.

On Sunday, Chávez threatened to go to war if Colombia ever carried out a similar attack against the FARC in Venezuelan territory.

"When you threaten war against a country, that's pretty serious," said Peter Hakim, president of the Washington-based policy group Inter-American Dialogue. "Certainly if it were coming from anyone but Hugo Chávez, people would be taking it extremely seriously. But our experience is that he tries to take advantage of what situation emerges to get himself this kind of international attention."

The U.S. State Department defended Colombia's pursuit of FARC members and encouraged bilateral discussions to solve the crisis.

"From our perspective, this is an issue between Colombia and Ecuador," Tom Casey, a department spokesman, told the Associated Press. "I'm not sure what this has to do with Venezuela.

Bush Says US Stands by Colombia

The Associated Press
Tuesday, March 4, 2008; 2:58 PM

WASHINGTON -- President Bush criticized "provocative maneuvers" toward Colombia by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, saying Tuesday that the United States stands with its ally, Colombia President Alvaro Uribe.

"America fully supports Colombia's democracy," Bush said. "We firmly oppose any acts of aggression that could destabilize the region."

Bush said he personally delivered this message to Uribe during a phone call earlier Tuesday. Colombia has received some $5 billion in U.S. aid to counter the drug trade and battle leftist guerrillas since 2000, and Uribe is considered a right-leaning ally of Bush's in a region dominated by leftist politics.

Relations have hit a new low between Uribe on one side and Chavez and Ecuador's President Rafael Correa on the other. Bush, making a rare and hastily scheduled personal appearance to describe a private conversation with a foreign leader, added himself to Uribe's side.

The raised tensions were triggered by a weekend raid by Colombian troops into Ecuador that killed a top commander of the FARC, Colombia's main rebel group, which had set up a camp there. Since then, Colombia and Ecuador have traded accusations and Chavez, sympathizing with the leftist rebels, ordered thousands of troops to move toward Venezuela's border with Colombia.

"America will continue to stand with Colombia as it confronts violence and terror and fights drug traffickers," Bush said.

Colombian military officials have said that U.S. satellite intelligence and communications intercepts have been key to putting the FARC on the defensive.

Bush said one of the chief ways that Washington can help Uribe is for Congress to approve a free-trade deal with Colombia. Though signed by the two countries in 2006, Capitol Hill's Democratic leaders have refused to pass the agreement, citing human rights violations in Colombia and its standing as the deadliest country in the world for organized labor.

Supporters have argued that the pact would level the playing field for U.S. products by requiring Colombia to lower or eliminate tariffs on them when many Colombian products already get such preferences in the American market.

Bush has sought to add new urgency to the debate by proclaiming the issue also a matter of national security _ and he used the crisis in South America as an opportunity to do so again.

"If we fail to approve this agreement, we will let down our close ally, we will damage our credibility in the region, and we will embolden the demagogues in our hemisphere," he said. "(Uribe) told me that the people across the region are watching to see what the United States will do. So Republicans and Democrats in Congress need to come together and approve this agreement."

Venezuela sends troops to Colombia border

The Associated Press
Tuesday, March 4, 2008

BOGOTÁ: Hundreds of Venezuelan troops moved toward the border with Colombia on Tuesday, where trade was slowing amid heightening tension after Colombia's cross-border strike on a rebel base in Ecuador.

The Organization of American States scheduled an emergency afternoon meeting in Washington to try to calm one of the region's worst political showdowns in years, between Colombia and Venezuela's president, Hugo Chávez, and his allies.

Colombian and Ecuadorean officials, meanwhile, traded accusations in the United Nations and the International Criminal Court.

The escalation of tensions was set off over the weekend when Colombia troops crossed the border with Ecuador and killed Raúl Reyes, a top commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, whose rebels had set up a camp there.

Chávez, who sympathizes with the leftist rebels, condemned the killing and angrily ordered about 9,000 soldiers - 10 battalions - to Venezuela's border with Colombia. He warned President Álvaro Uribe of Colombia that any strike on Venezuelan soil could provoke a South American war.

Colombia's defense minister said Monday that he would not be provoked into mobilizing troops in response.

President George W. Bush said the United States would stand by Colombia and criticized Venezuela's government for making "provocative maneuvers." Colombia has received about $5 billion in U.S. aid to fight drugs and leftist rebels since 2000.

Alberto Muller Rojas, a retired Venezuelan general and former top Chávez aide, said the troops were being sent to the border region as "a preventative measure."

Soldiers boarded buses and trucks at the Paramaracay base in central Venezuela on Tuesday morning, and battalions also were moving out from the northern state of Lara, its pro-Chávez governor, Luis Reyes, said.

The Venezuelan military has been tight-lipped about troop movements. Venezuela's armed forces include about 100,000 troops, Muller Rojas said. Colombia's U.S.-equipped and trained military has more than twice as many.

Uribe said his government would ask the International Criminal Court to try Chávez, alleging that he had financed "genocide" committed by the FARC. Uribe alleged that a laptop computer the Colombians said belonged to Raúl Reyes contained a reference to a $300 million Venezuelan payment.

The biggest losers from the killing of Reyes appeared to be the hostages that the FARC rebels have held for years, pending a swap with rebel prisoners.

Ecuador and France said they had been communicating with Reyes, trying to secure a hostage release, when Colombia's air force crossed the border to bomb his jungle camp. Along with Reyes, 20 other rebels were killed.

"I'm sorry to tell you that the conversations were pretty advanced to free 12 hostages," Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa, said in a nationally televised address. "All of this was frustrated by the war-mongering, authoritarian hands" of the Colombian government.

A French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Pascale Andréani, confirmed that France had been in contact with Reyes and that "the Colombians were aware of it."

Colombia said documents in Reyes's laptop indicate that Correa's internal security minister met recently with a FARC envoy to discuss deepening relations with Ecuador and even replacing military officers who might oppose that.

Publicly, there had been no indication of even preliminary progress in securing the release of any of the 40 hostages the FARC wants to swap for hundreds of jailed guerrillas. Those hostages include three U.S. military contractors and a former Colombian presidential candidate, Ingrid Betancourt, who also has French nationality and who has become a cause célèbre in Europe.

The raid Saturday followed last week's release by the FARC of four hostages to Venezuela's justice minister, Ramón Rodríguez Chacín. The minister said the raid proved the "intent of the fascist Colombian government is to hamper the handover of hostages, because that is the path of peace."

Another victim of the crisis may be border trade, valued at $5 billion a year, most of it Colombian exports sorely needed by Venezuelans who are already suffering milk and meat shortages. Ecuador also depends on about $1.8 billion in trade with Colombia.

Venezuela said it would stop new exports and imports. At one closed border crossing, in Paraguachon, Venezuela, the authorities stopped trucks lined up Tuesday morning. But traffic was flowing normally at another crossing, in El Amparo, where a handful of Venezuelan troops stood watch as usual, the customs office was open, and traffic passed freely.