FARC Warns of Panama
Guard Interference
BOGOTA - The Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia (FARC) said on Tuesday that the
Panamanian guard is taking part in joint
patrolling of the border with the Colombian
Army, in close coordination with the US
Marines.
In a communiqué released by Nueva Colombia
news agency (ANNCOL), the insurgent group
said that the Panamanian government might
not be aware of this because they said last
January that they would not be involved in
the Colombian internal conflict.
It was a decision that the guerrilla
welcomed, "in the wake of the killing, by
shooting them at close range, of three FARC
guerrillas by members of the Panamanian
Guard in Darien, where another two
insurgents were wounded and captured."
However, FARC says that may be the
Panamanian Government is unaware of the fact
that their border guard is taking part in
joint patrolling with the Colombian Army in
close coordination with marines of the US
naval base deployed in the area.
"This attitude contrasts with the Panamanian
National Guard's passivity and the
complicity of the Colombian Army and
Government when paramilitary forces
devastated the region for over a decade,
killing and displacing thousands of farmers
and residents of this border area", the text
added.
The insurgent group also denounces that
through Panamanian Radio Voz Sin Fronteras
guerrillas are urged to desert and give
themselves up to the nearest military
garrison.
Meanwhile, copying Colombian Army practices,
the Panamanian Guard throws leaflets from
choppers with the photographs of commanders
of the 57th Front, offering a $150,000
reward for their capture or killing.
"To the Panamanians we say that above this
unjustified hostility that we hope to be
corrected, lies our border policy, according
to which the FARC guerrilla refrains from
attacking the armed forces of neighboring
countries," says the text signed by the
General Staff of the Ivan Rios Bloc, in the
mountains of Colombia.
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