Venezuela supports Colombian guerrilla group the FARC, providing the rebels with logistical and financial support, U.S. Southern Command General Douglas Fraser said Wednesday, reports El Tiempo.
The general said at a news conference that “there is a relationship which has been documented between the government of Venezuela and the FARC.”
“It’s financial support, it’s enabling their capacity from a logistics standpoint,” Fraser said. “My understanding is that that continues.”
The general’s allegations about FARC-Venezuela links stand in contrast to his statement before U.S. lawmakers on March 11 that he knew of no evidence of links between the guerrillas and the Venezuelan government, reports AFP.
The general denied accusations by Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez that a U.S plane flying over the Colombian-Venezuelan border recently was spying.
“The accusation is false. The EU supports Colombia in the fight against the FARC and the drug trade and all flights are supporting these efforts,” the commander said.
Fraser’s words on the subject of a Caracas-FARC link are the most direct yet from the U.S., which has spoken of probable ties in the past.
The U.S. Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Arturo Valenzuela said in a congress hearing on March 10 that there were “some indications there had been some assistance” from Caracas to the FARC.
In early March, a Spanish judge formally accused the Venezuelan government of illicit cooperation with the FARC, as well as with the Basque separatist group, ETA.