LatinNews Daily Report - 01 July 2013

POLITICS | Catatumbo protestors agree to meet Santos. On 30 June the Asociación Campesina del Catatumbo (Ascamcat), an association of peasant farmers from Colombia’s north-eastern Catatumbo region, issued a statement saying that they accepted President Juan Manuel Santos’ invitation to come to Bogotá to hold talks with him and his cabinet on 2 July. For over two weeks, peasant farmers in the Catatumbo have been involved in violent protests over various demands like the suspensions of the government’s coca eradication programme in the area. The Santos government has already attempted to hold talks with the protestors, who have set up road blocks in the remote area that the government has ordered the security forces to clear. However, the talks have failed due to protestors’ refusal to lift their road blocks until they have secured “concrete agreements” with the government. In a bid to overcome the impasse, on 29 June Santos invited the protestors to the capital to meet him at the presidential palace in order to find a solution to the conflict, which the Ascamcat has accepted. According to its statement, as “a sign of good faith” the group had decided to lift the road block affecting the main access road into the town of Ocaña, Norte de Santander department, which has been a focus of violence in recent weeks. Yet the statement was clear that this did not mean an end to the demonstrations.

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