Colombia’s FARC kicks off last congress as guerrilla army

Their safety has been ensured by the government, which has also said that they are welcome to launch a political party.

Santos’ statement comes less than two weeks before he will sign a peace accord with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), whose members were killed following a previous peace agreement in the mid 1980s when they formed the Patriotic Union (UP) political party. The latest opinion polls show 72% of Colombians intend to vote “yes” in the October 2 referendum on the agreement, a result which would mark a decisive rebuff to the reactionary hard-liners who wanted to wage unending war against the FARC-EP.

The statements amounted to an implicit denial of rumors that dissident factions within the FARC, which has an estimated 7,500 fighters, may not sign on to the peace process.

Negotiated in Havana during a lengthy process encouraged by the government of Cuba and supported by the worldwide community, this agreement opens the door to a new era for the people of Colombia, after decades of state repression and paramilitary violence.

President Juan Manuel Santos said on Thursday that the party’s “extermination” should have never taken place.

Once a rebel safe haven, San Vicente del Caguan today is a thriving center of commerce serving cattle ranchers and oil drillers who have arrived in droves.

With this “historic” agreement “it is definitely clear that in this war there are neither winners nor losers”, said rebel leader Timoleon Jimenez, as he opened the event.

The conference is set to mark another first: FARC leaders will be meeting not in secret, but with the authorities’ full support in the presence of around 900 people, including 50 guests and some 350 journalists from around the world.

Fifteen years after negotiations with leftist rebels collapsed in a fury of violence, the road to peace in Colombia once again passes through this remote southern town near where leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia are gathering in a jungle conclave for their last meeting as an armed insurgency.

Ariel Avila of the Peace and Reconciliation Foundation said ratification should proceed smoothly. “That basically means 10 percent must be convinced during the conference”.

“There is no doubt about that, but the event is very important symbolically”, said Masse, a professor at Bogota’s Externado University.

After almost four years of peace talks in Cuba, FARC leaders are now seeking their troops’ backing for the deal, which aims to end a half-century conflict that has claimed 260,000 lives.

Recent opinion polls put the “Yes” vote ahead by some 40 percentage points.