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FARC controls 60 percent of drug trade - Colombia's police chief

By Helen Murphy and Luis Jaime Acosta BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombia's FARC rebels control more than 60 percent of the Andean nation's drug trade, including cocaine trafficking overseas, an activity the armed group has denied during peace talks in Cuba, Colombia's police chief said on Monday.

Colombia's Santos changes mind on two-year re-election bid

By Eduardo Garcia BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos on Monday said he is no longer considering running for a shorter term of two years in 2014 and told lawmakers it was too early to consider an extension of presidential terms to six years.

Pacific Rubiales to make windfall production payment to Ecopetrol

Bogota, Apr 17 (EFE).- Canada's Pacific Rubiales said it will hand over 1.56 million barrels of crude produced at the Quifa oil block, in which it owns a 60 percent stake, to Colombian state-controlled oil company Ecopetrol. Colombia's No. 2 oil producer after Ecopetrol, Pacific Rubiales said in a statement Wednesday that it would make the payment in compliance with a recent ruling by an arbitration tribunal.

Colombia billboards feature rebel chief, slain drug baron

Billboards showing the faces of slain Colombian drug cartel chief Pablo Escobar and a leftist guerrilla leader have set off a controversy by asking: "Guess who has killed more police?" Colombia's National Electoral Council ordered that the billboards, which were put up in the northwestern city of Medellin by former vice president Francisco Santos, be taken down immediately. Santos, a cousin of President Juan Manuel Santos and a close ally of ex-president Alvaro Uribe, has said he hopes to run for the presidency in 2014.

Former Colombia leader pans peace talks with rebels

Colombia's former leader Alvaro Uribe had harsh criticism Saturday for current President Juan Manuel Santos's peace overtures to leftist rebels, whom he likened to infamous drug kingpins. In an interview published Saturday in Chile's El Mercurio daily, Uribe compared the crimes of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with the worst acts committed by notorious drug lord Pablo Escobar. Uribe urged his successor to deal more severely with leftist fighters rather than treating them "with impunity."

Colombia returns land to peasants plundered by militias

Monteria, Colombia, Apr 10 (EFE).- President Juan Manuel Santos traveled to the northern province of Cordoba on Wednesday to preside over the restoration of lands stolen from 60 peasant families by the founders of Colombia's murderous AUC militia movement. "Where the murders reigned, the peasants return," Santos said to an enthusiasic ovation. "You who have suffered from violence like nobody else understand the significance of seizing these lands from the Castaño clan," the president told a crowd of some 400 people in a rural area near Monteria.

Santos leads march for peace in Colombia

President Juan Manuel Santos led Colombians in a massive march for peace Tuesday, calling for an end to decades of armed conflict at a time when peace talks in Havana are under fire from his predecessor Alvaro Uribe. Hundreds of soldiers joined Santos and his cabinet ministers at the Plaza of the Fallen Heroes, one of seven starting points for the march by thousands of people, many of them in white T-shirts and carrying white flags.

Thousands of Colombians march for peace

Bogota, Apr 9 (EFE).- Thousands of Colombians filled the streets of this capital and other cities Tuesday to support the peace process being negotiated by the government and FARC rebels, in the most pluralistic rally that anyone here remembers, with President Juan Manuel Santos and leftist groups marching together. The only sectors missing were the most extreme conservatives, for whom military action is the only way to end Colombia's decades-long armed conflict, and some members of the opposition, who see the march as nothing but a ploy by Santos to win votes in the next election.

Colombians march in polarizing bid to make peace with FARC

By Helen Murphy BOGOTA (Reuters) - Waving balloons and dressed in white, tens of thousands of Colombians marched in Bogota and across the nation on Tuesday in a polarizing gathering for peace that critics slam as a show of support for Marxist FARC rebels. Throngs of people chanting "We want peace" advanced toward the capital's main square, Plaza Bolivar, a few blocks from where former presidential candidate Jorge Eliecer Gaitan was assassinated on April 9, 65 years ago.

Colombians march in polarising bid to bring peace with FARC

By Helen Murphy BOGOTA (Reuters) - Waving balloons and dressed in white, tens of thousands of Colombians marched in Bogota and across the nation on Tuesday in a polarizing gathering for peace that critics slam as a show of support for Marxist FARC rebels. Throngs of people chanting "we want peace" advanced toward the capital's main square, Plaza Bolivar, a few blocks from where former presidential candidate Jorge Eliecer Gaitan was assassinated on April 9, 65 years ago.
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