LatinNews Daily - 28 February 2018

Colombia: Interior Minister Guillermo Rivera has condemned the latest bomb attack targeting Colombia’s security forces carried out by the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN) guerrillas, saying that this impedes the resumption of the suspended peace negotiations that the government had been holding with the ELN leadership in Quito, Ecuador. Rivera’s remarks came after it was confirmed that five Colombian soldiers had been killed and a further ten had been wounded in the attack registered on 27 February near the city of Cúcuta, the capital of Norte de Santander department. The attack came after earlier this week the ELN announced that it will observe a unilateral ceasefire from 9-13 March, so as not to affect Colombia’s 11 March national legislative elections. The Quito talks were suspended in January after the ELN broke the bilateral ceasefire that it had agreed with the government in support of the talks. The ELN’s announcement of a unilateral ceasefire raised hopes that the Quito talks could be resumed but Rivera yesterday said that “as long as the ELN remains incoherent [in its actions] there are no conditions for dialogue. The ball is in the ELN’s court”.

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