Colombian government and National Liberation Army (ELN) announce dialogue table agreements
The agreements refer to guarantor and accompanying countries of the process, humanitarian relief actions and dialogue communication actions.
After concluding a week of work at the dialogue table looking for peace, the Government of Colombia and the National Liberation Army (ELN) announced this Friday that they reached three agreements to strengthen that process.
The parties formalized the Secretary General of the United Nations (UN), through his special representative in Colombia, Carlos Ruiz Massieu, and the Colombian Episcopal Conference as accompaniers of the dialogue.
In addition, they agreed to invite Germany, Sweden, Switzerland and Spain to consider their participation as companions, and that diplomatic actions be carried out with the United States Government to learn of their interest in participating in this process through a special envoy to the table.
The parties decided to resume an agreement corresponding to the dialogue agenda they had in March 2016, referring to humanitarian actions. In this sense, it was reported that humanitarian relief processes will be carried out in the short term.
For this, a mechanism will be formed from the dialogue table that will have the accompaniment of the United Nations Verification Mission in the South American country and the Church.
Lastly, the Colombian government and the ELN agreed to form a joint communication team to provide objective, timely, clear, and transparent information on the process of the dialogue table.
The parties also communicated that the deliberations were held in Caracas, in an atmosphere of trust and optimism, with the presence of the guarantor countries and the accompaniment of the UN Secretary General through his UN special representative in Colombia, as well as the local Catholic church.
