This Friday, the guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN) ordered a five-day ceasefire as “a gesture for Colombia” to “facilitate election day” on March 13.
The ceasefire will begin at midnight on March 10 and will end “at midnight on the 15th of the same month,” says a statement released today by that guerrilla.
Colombians will go to the polls on March 13 to elect the entire Senate and the House of Representatives, as well as the 16 seats of the victims of the armed conflict in the House, and there will also be three coalition consultations to elect presidential candidates.
“It is a gesture with Colombia, in which we reaffirm our commitment to a political solution and transformations,” says the ELN in the statement, and clarifies that it is not a gesture with the government of President Iván Duque, of which it says that “it was always denied peace and any option for change that benefits the majority”.
The ELN entered into peace negotiations with the previous Colombian government but the talks, which began in Quito and were later transferred to Havana, were suspended days before Duque assumed the presidency.
From the beginning, Duque conditioned the resumption of negotiations on the ELN renouncing all criminal activity, especially kidnapping, and releasing all the people it has captives, a demand that has not been accepted by that guerrilla.
Four years ago the ELN also declared a ceasefire during legislative and presidential elections, which were the quietest in the country’s recent history.
“It is our autonomous will to announce the cessation, we reserve the right to defend ourselves if our units are attacked or if we try to take advantage of the cessation,” the guerrilla statement added.
The ELN concludes its statement today with the warning that “last year’s portentous social mobilizations” are a sign that “this year the Colombian people will continue to mobilize because they are determined to win changes for Colombia.”
This announcement comes a week after the ELN carried out an “armed strike” in which for three days it attacked infrastructure works and paralyzed transport and commerce in various regions of the country through threats and the placement of explosives, actions which left a dozen injured.
Defense Minister Diego Molano referred to today’s announcement of the ceasefire during the elections and said that the ELN is politically motivated after “affecting the mobility and tranquility of Colombians” with the “armed strike.”
“They do it only with a political purpose of influencing the elections so that they open false peace talks or some others offer them social forgiveness,” the minister said at an act in Bucaramanga, capital of the department of Santander, in the northeast of the country. . (I)
Source: Eluniverso
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