Colombia Thwarts Guerrilla Attempt to Attack CapitalColombian Attorney General's office announced Monday that it has thwarted a scheme of the rebel National Liberation Army (ELN) to attack military and civilian targets in the capital of Bogota after arresting nine members of the group.The office said in a report that the arrested individuals allegedly belonged to an urban ELN network in the south of Bogota, which was dismembered when 13 houses in the area were stormed by the police. The police found explosives, cartridges and communications equipment, by which the organization connected with urban networks operating in the capital. The group planned to attack energy facilities and explode automatic teller machines in Bogota, the office said. After peace negotiations broke off last Tuesday between the government and the guerrilla group, the ELN increased attacks against both civilian and military targets, killing more than 20 recently. The second largest guerrilla forces in Colombia after the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia also destroyed a dozen energy towers, nine of them in the state of Antioquia, and burnt at least 15 vehicles in different roads around the country. Colombian President Andres Pastrana decided to suspend peace contacts with the ELN in Venezuela last Tuesday, accusing the guerrilla group of lacking willingness to start formal talks to bring an end to the nearly four decades of civil armed conflicts. Pastrana said that the guerrilla group rejected every alternative the Executive Branch presented to the board of negotiations, including proposals that the military completely pull out of the northern Colombian area for holding negotiations and peace talks. For the past 37 years, Colombia has been locked in a bloody civil war which has pitted leftist rebels against government troops and right-wing paramilitaries. More than 200,000 people, mostly civilians, have lost their lives, while millions more have fled the country. |
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