Ecuador wants to receive a new copy of the hard drives the Colombian armed forces allegedly found in the camp of deceased FARC leader “Raul Reyes,” or technical support to read the copies the government has now.
Vice Foreign Minister Kintto Lucas made the announcement on Tuesday during a meeting of a Commission on Sensitive Issues in Quito, in the presence of the Ecuadorean and Colombia foreign ministers.
Colombia claims the armed forces found the hard drives in the 2008 raid on a FARC camp in Angostura, Ecuador. The Uribe government said that there was information on the drives which implicated Ecuador’s government in dealing with the FARC. The drives were finally handed over to Ecuador in August, when Santos became president, after they had been requested for many months.
Ecuador’s Foreign Minister Ricardo Patiño said in September that files were unreadable due to “technical difficulties.”
Lucas stated Tuesday Ecuador wants the hard disks in order to carry out a “technical analysis of how the information was placed, the rupture of the security system, and all those matters.” He further added Ecuador will never accept the veracity of the information the hard disks contain, as “they can never be sure it belonged to Reyes.”
In 2008, Ecuador cut diplomatic ties with Colombia after a Colombian military raid on its territory. Ecuador viewed this raid as a violation of its sovereignty.