At the beginning of the fourth cycle of peace talks in Caracas, the delegations of the Government of Colombia and the National Liberation Army – ELN, declare the following:
- They reaffirm their conviction about the importance of the participation of society in this process, and of the transformations as the basis for peace and a national agreement. Along this route, the public act held on August 3 in Bogotá shows the development and positive results of the Cuba Agreements. Said event, unprecedented in the history of the search for peace between the parties, highlighted that the distinctive sign of this process begins to be, in effect, the democratic construction of peace with the participation of Colombian society in its
- The advances of the Roundtable are also reflected in the fulfillment of the scheduled schedule for the implementation of the social participation and ceasefire agreements. Regarding the first, the National Participation Committee was installed with its members, its coordination body, its technical secretariat and its five commissions. Likewise, the first steps have been taken for the deployment of 25 national and territorial processes for the design of said participation that will take place in the next four months.
- Regarding the Bilateral, National and Temporary Ceasefire, after July 6, the following has been achieved: i) extending the mandate of the verification mission of the UN Security Council; ii) implement the Monitoring and Verification Mechanism throughout the country and open communication channels to avoid confrontations, and iii) learn, verify and jointly clarify each fact reported to the mechanism. This contributes to improving the humanitarian situation of the populations and
- In this cycle, the delegations will continue developing these two agreements. Likewise, they will address other relevant issues regarding the development of the dialogue agenda and the peace process. The results of these new works will be opportunely communicated to the public opinion. Additionally, and in parallel, members of both delegations continue their work in Colombia developing the tasks of both the design of participation and the Monitoring and Verification Mechanism.
The Government and the ELN once again thank the government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela for the hospitality and work that has made this new cycle of dialogues possible. They also express their gratitude to the guarantor countries and to the special representative of the UN Secretary General, Carlos Ruiz Massieu, to the Episcopal Conference of Colombia, as well as to the Group of Support, Accompaniment and Cooperation Countries.
