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Venezuelan, Colombian Leaders Meet to Bury the Hatchet
AFP
July 11, 2008
PUNTO FIJO, Venezuela (AFP) — The presidents of Venezuela and Colombia, Hugo Chavez and Alvaro Uribe, put aside months of animosity Friday to meet in northwest Venezuela with the aim of normalizing ties.
The leaders, who held their face-to-face in the town of Punto Fijo, had nourished sharp differences on the issue of the FARC, Colombia's notorious guerilla group, with Chavez ideologically supporting them and Uribe considering them a terrorist threat to be eradicated.
But with the liberation early this month of 15 FARC hostages, including Franco-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and three US defense contractors, and the weakening of the rebels' leadership, the situation has changed in Uribe's favor.
Chavez has since stepped away from his rhetorical backing of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia guerrillas and ended his insults against his Colombian counterpart, whom he has said he would now treat as a "brother."
The two would have "a frank reunion because in my heart of hearts what I have for Colombia is affection, love and brotherly commitment," Chavez told reporters just before Uribe arrived.
"We need to get back on the path, reactivate our relations. But that depends on a lot of things," he said.
The last time the two met was in late 2007, before Uribe publicly dropped Chavez as official mediator with the FARC amid longstanding tensions between the two forceful personalities.
Things got worse in March, when a cross-border raid by Colombian forces into Ecuador, a Venezuelan ally, to kill a FARC leader, Raul Reyes, prompted Chavez to mobilize troops along the Venezuela-Colombia border.
The FARC rebels also sought to stir the pot by releasing six hostages to Chavez in January and February in a bid to embarrass Uribe.
Colombia, for its part, crowed that it had captured computers in its Ecuador raid showing Chavez had financially and possibly militarily supplied the FARC.
But the triumph of the release of Betancourt and the other hostages this month -- said to have been secured through a daring Colombian military operation in which soldiers masqueraded as aid workers -- and Venezuela's dependence on Colombian trade for basic foodstuffs and other goods eventually put pressure on the neighbors to smooth over their dispute.
Friday's meeting was expected to focus on cooperation along the shared border and trade.
Several accords were said to be prepared for signing, including increasing the quota of Colombian vehicles imported into Venezuela, investment protection, a treaty on income taxes, and a promise to facilitate the passage of goods across the border.
Colombia is Venezuela's second-biggest trading partner, after the United States which buys up much of its oil, and exchanges amount to around six billion dollars a year. Colombian exports to Venezuela exceed Venezuelan exports to its neighbor.
"This meeting holds an intention for closer ties, cooperation, peace and Latin American integration," Chavez said.
The presidents planned to visit a huge oil refinery in the nearby town of Amuay. It was there in November 2005 that the two agreed to build a cross-border gas pipeline which was inaugurated on the Colombian side last year.
A joint media conference was scheduled for later Friday.
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