Foreign Diplomats Return to Colombia Peace Talks as Deadline Looms
Rebels with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) have until Sunday to make substantial progress towards reaching a cease-fire, and an end to hostilities, in talks with the government.
Two FARC negotiators met at midday Friday with James Lemoyne, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's special advisor on Colombia, as well as diplomats from Cuba, Sweden, France, Spain, Italy, Norway, Canada, Switzerland, Mexico and Venezuela.
The Roman Catholic church was represented by the Papal Nuncio and Archbishop Alberto Giraldo, an influential Colombian cleric.
The diplomats and the clerics later met with government peace commissioner Camilo Gomez, who on Thursday presented the FARC with a firm schedule for negotiations.
"The country knows that time is running out and it is indispensable to make a decision," Gomez told reporters at the end of the meeting. "The government handed (Thursday) a proposed schedule to the FARC that we expect can be fulfilled in the shortest time possible."
FARC negotiators were the first to leave, and had no statement to the press. Giraldo however described the talks as "cordial."
If talks collapse, the rebels will have 48 hours starting at 0500 GMT Wednesday to leave their Switzerland-sized safe haven ahead of a military operation.
The FARC has long opposed the presence of foreign observers in their territory -- but on Monday they called for foreigners to be present at the talks. Colombian Foreign Minister Fernandez de Soto followed suit on Wednesday.
French Ambassador Daniel Parfait, who coordinates the group of 10 countries, earlier said there are no plans for the diplomats to remain at the talks beyond January 20.
And the group "in no case" will become peace mediators, he told AFP in Bogota. "Our efficiency and our credibility depend on that," he added.