Colombia Rebels Make Concessions Toward Peace

Leftist rebels made an uncharacteristic bow to public pressure Friday with an agreement to suspend roadside kidnappings and to immediately discuss a possible cease-fire, injecting new life into Colombia’s moribund peace process.

In the accord, read by Peace Commissioner Camilo Gomez in a televised address, the 17,000-strong Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, promised to stop erecting rural roadblocks with the intent to kidnap wealthy travelers. The announcement comes after the slaying last month of a popular former culture minister, Consuelo N. Araujo, who had been snatched from her vehicle by the FARC about a week earlier.

Her death spurred many top politicians to call for President Andres Pastrana to suspend talks with the guerrilla group until it made a goodwill gesture. With Friday’s accord, that demand seemed to have been met. If the FARC abides by it, the accord will mark the most generous concession by the rebels in three years of stalled peace negotiations.

“The peace process requires a propitious environment, without armed confrontation between both sides,” said Gomez, reading from a nine-point memorandum after meeting with the FARC’s taciturn commander, Manuel “Sureshot” Marulanda, in the south. To this end, Gomez said, rebel and government envoys will “immediately take on” a recent proposal to suspend hostilities.

In a reference to mass kidnappings at remote roadblocks, known in Colombia as “miracle fishing,” the FARC said it would instruct all its members to stop the practice. Though a far cry from a moratorium on all kidnappings, it was meant to calm public outrage over the Araujo slaying.

For the first time since peace talks began, the FARC said it would respect elected officials and municipal authorities in a southern haven ceded to the group in 1998. Pastrana withdrew troops from the Switzerland-size swath of tropical lowlands to get talks started, but human rights monitors charge that the FARC has created a state within a state there, conducting extrajudicial killings to consolidate control.

The haven’s status is scheduled to expire Tuesday, but with the recent advance at the peace table, the president will almost certainly extend the term of the enclave for many months.

In addition, the FARC invited presidential candidates to come and go as they please in the region. The move marks a reversal from last weekend, when heavily armed rebel fighters barred Colombia’s front-running candidate from entering the military-free zone on a whistle-stop campaign tour.