Colombian Church Helps Huegun

Today at Berria:

Colombian church intervenes for the ELN to release Asier Huegun

Colombian church mediators and the ELN have agreed that a committee be sent to the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta next week

Amagoia Iban – DONOSTIA (San Sebastian)

It is two months to the day that the guerrillas kidnapped Huegun and six tourists, but the “deadlock” is about to be resolved. On September 12 the trail of Asier Huegun and another six tourists was lost in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (Colombia); they have been in the hands of the ELN ever since as instruments to make the human tragedy that is taking place in that region known to the whole world.

The six have been in the hands of the ELN, the Colombian National Liberation Army, in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (in the Magdalena region of Colombia). Four Israelis, a Briton, a German and a Basque citizen, Asier Huegun Etxeberria, have been in this situation for the last two months.

While they were spending the night of September 12 in the Ciudad Perdida Natural Park in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta a group of fifteen were captured by armed people. Seven of the group were released immediately.

On September 14 the Colombian police announced that 8 tourists had been kidnapped and that news of them had been provided by local indigenous people. The names of the hostages were not revealed but the FARC, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, were accused of being behind the kidnapping. Alvaro Uribe, the Colombian president, deployed 1,500 soldiers, 9 helicopters and an aircraft carrier in a rescue operation. The following day the names of the tourists were disclosed. On September 16 the FARC issued a statement saying they were not involved.

On September 20 the Northern Block of the paramilitary group, the AUC, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, also denied they were holding the eight tourists. Four days later Asier Huegun’s father and sister arrived in Bogota together with Txema Urkijo, the Head of Human Rights of the Basque Autonomous Community Government. The Columbian army announced that one of the hostages, Matthew Scott, had turned up safe and sound.

On September 26 Alvaro Uribe said that the kidnappers were ELN members. Three days later the ELN issued a statement saying the tourists were being “detained”. They also called for international observers to be sent to the Sierra Nevada to see the “injustice” being committed by the “paramilitary groups and other state forces.” The Government asked the church to mediate and on September 30 the church agreed do so.

On October 2 the priests Dario Echeverri and Alberto Giraldo met with one of the ELN spokesmen being held in the prison of Itagui. Church representatives agreed to go to the Sierra Nevada. On October 8 one of the ELN spokesmen, Felipe Torres, was granted conditional release. The following day the priests Hector Fabio Henao and Dario Echeverri set off for Santa Marta on “a humanitarian mission”.

On October 20 the ELN said they were prepared to release Asier Huegun, if three members of the Basque Autonomous Community Parliament went to the Sierra Nevada to collect him. They regarded the offer as a gesture of “solidarity with the Basque Country”. President Uribe did not agree to this and on October 21 Asier Huegun-Etxeberria’s family requested that “no political conditions be imposed” on Asier’s liberation. The following day the ELN withdrew the offer accusing Uribe of “shortsightedness”.

Church representatives went to the Itagui prison on October 27. The ELN proposed that the seven tourists be released one by one starting with Asier Huegun. They requested the release of the detained spokesman, Francisco Galan, and discussed sending UN and church representatives to the region to see the “human tragedy” for themselves. The next day Uribe agreed to the ELN’s proposal. Two days later the guerrillas were asked to release all the tourists but the ELN did not agree to this.

On November 6 the priest Dario Echeverri, the former attorney Jaime Bernal, the former minister Maria Emma Mejia and the lecturer and political scientist Alejo Vargas spent nine hours speaking to Francisco Galan in the Itagui prison.

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