 Colombian President Alvaro Uribe offered on Saturday to meet his Venezuelan counterpart, Hugo Chavez, to defuse a widening diplomatic dispute over the capture of a top Colombian rebel in Venezuela.
| And we all know how Hugo has a short fuse. |
Venezuela this week recalled its ambassador from Bogota to protest last month's Colombian police operation, which it says violated sovereignty by abducting the rebel chief from Caracas. Chavez froze bilateral economic projects on Friday between the trade partners and demanded a public apology. Far from apologizing, Colombia has defended the Dec. 13 capture of Rodrigo Granda, foreign-relations chief of the Colombian leftist FARC rebel group, which has fought a four-decades-old war against the government. Both Bogota and Washington call the FARC a terrorist group. Uribe, a staunch ally of the US global campaign against terrorism, signaled Saturday he was ready to talk to Chavez, a fiery nationalist hailed by Latin America's left as a standard-bearer against US "imperialism". "President Uribe would be ready to discuss the issue (of Granda's capture) in a multilateral presidential summit," a high-ranking Colombian official, who asked not to be named, told Reuters in Bogota. The source said the meeting could be at a regional forum, such as the Ibero-American Group or the Andean Community of Nations, in which other leaders could take part. Chavez denies US and Colombian charges he shelters the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia). He says Colombia committed a crime by bribing members of an elite Venezuelan National Guard anti-kidnap squad to snatch Granda from the heart of Caracas. Five Venezuelan national guards have been arrested for handing Granda over to Colombia for a reward.
| "Elite" police taking a bribe, whodathunk? |
| Chavez denies US and Colombian charges he shelters the FARC, but the guy was in downtown Caracas? |
"Let's hope the Colombian president reconsiders and doesn't end up supporting a crime ... behaving very much like the United States government," Chavez said late Friday.
| As opposed to harboring a criminal, eh Hugo? |
While Chavez did not break diplomatic ties with Bogota, his sanctions may threaten future trade. Venezuela, the world's No. 5 oil exporter, is Colombia's second-largest export market. A Venezuelan military commander said the frontier remained open. But Colombia said Venezuela had closed the border near Cucuta, a major crossing point. Colombia defended Granda's capture as the legitimate arrest of a "terrorist". It reminded Chavez the United Nations forbade members to shelter terrorists and noted the FARC "foreign minister" had openly taken part in a pro-Chavez meeting of leftist groups in Caracas in December. The US ambassador in Bogota, William Wood, said Saturday his government backed Colombia's position "100 percent." He urged Venezuela to clarify whether it considered the FARC a terrorist group or not.
| No need, Hugo did that a while back. |
In Caracas, Venezuelan Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel released a statement saying, "The only issue under discussion here is the violation of the sovereignty of a nation." Washington gives hefty financial and military aid for Bogota's Plan Colombia offensive against drug-traffickers and Marxist rebels. The Colombian and US governments have asked Andean neighbors to cooperate. "Plan Colombia is turning into an Andean Plan," Alberto Garrido, a Venezuelan expert on Venezuelan-Colombian affairs, told Reuters. "Chavez has said again 'we're not going to cooperate' and Uribe is saying, 'well, if you don't, we're going to carry on doing the same thing'," he added. |