Official in Colombian Peace Process Is Slain in Ambush

A congressional leader of Colombia’s peace process was shot and killed Friday together with his mother and five other people on the highway that leads from a regional airport to the Switzerland-size area that the government ceded to guerrillas two years ago, police said.

Rep. Diego Turbay, chairman of the commission assigned to represent Congress in the Colombian government’s negotiations with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, was the second prominent civilian associated with peace efforts to be attacked in the past two weeks.

Turbay died when gunfire ripped through his armored car, police spokeswoman Ruth Ruparte said. The gunmen also killed two bodyguards who had been assigned by police; Turbay’s secretary; his mother, Maria Ines Cote; and two people who were not identified.

The victims were on their way to the inauguration of the newly elected mayor of Puerto Rico, a town about halfway between Florencia, the capital of Caqueta province, south of Bogota, and the entrance to the zone controlled by FARC, Colombia’s oldest and largest rebel group.

The two-lane highway is dotted with military and rebel roadblocks. Police blamed a FARC unit but did not explain why.

A FARC representative said she did not know whether the insurgent commanders would comment on the shooting, and added that an investigation would have to be completed before a statement was made.

Initial police and military reports in the past have blamed guerrillas for deaths that on further investigation proved to be the acts of other groups. So far, most violence against peace activists has come from right-wing private armies, known as self-defense forces, or AUC, that have been excluded from the peace process.

The AUC has been blamed for the attack two weeks ago that wounded labor leader Wilson Borja, who was working to smooth the way for talks between the government and a smaller rebel group.

Local politicians have been routinely kidnapped and killed by armed groups in Colombia’s 36-year conflict. Being a member of Caqueta’s most prominent opposition Liberal Party family could have made Turbay a target.

Like most of Colombia’s powerful political clans, the Turbays have suffered tragedies similar to the Kennedys in the United States. Four years ago, Turbay’s brother, Rodrigo, a former president of the Colombian Congress, drowned in a riverboat accident while he was a FARC hostage.

Their cousin, Diana, a journalist and daughter of former President Julio Cesar Turbay, was abducted by drug traffickers and killed in 1991 when police tried to rescue her.