The FARC threaten to kill sixty council members of municipalities in
the Caquetá department, claiming the local politicians are
collaborating with the National Government.
Threatened council member Norberto Clavijo told press agency AP “Some sixty council members of the villages Montañita, Doncello, Paujil, Cartagena del Chairá, San Vicente del Caguán and Puerto Rico were threatened with death.”
According to Clavijo, the FARC considers the politicians collaborators of the Uribe administration. “In a message from the FARC to the councilmembers this week, they state we are informants of the Army and collaborators of the government of President Álvaro Uribe. For this we are ‘military objective’ and are our families in danger,” the politician said.
Following the threat, two members of the council of Montañita resigned, because they felt their safety could not be guaranteed enough to continue their work, Clavijo ssaid.
Fabio Estrada, chairman of the National Federation of Council Members, told the press agency that the problem of threats doesn’t end with the sixty Caquetá councilmembers. “The situation of the 12 thousand council members in the country is very complex and difficult,” he says. “There are more than 1,700 members of council threatened in the whole of Colombia, especially in the departments of Caquetá, Huila, Calle del Cauca and Arauca, directly by the FARC.”