The National Liberation Army (ELN) has assured this Sunday night, through a statement, that it has not yet released Luis Díaz’s father because the Army continues to carry out operations in the area where it has kidnapped him. “The area remains militarized, they carry out overflights, disembark troops, peritoneum, offer rewards and an intense rake operation. This situation does not allow the execution of the liberation plan quickly and safely, where Mr. Luis Manuel Díaz is not at risk,” declared the guerrilla. He also warned that “if operations continue in the area, they will delay the release and increase the risks.”
Around noon this Monday, Caracol Radio published that it had confirmed “from sources from the authorities in Barrancas that the Public Force will begin the withdrawal of uniformed personnel in the border area with Venezuela to facilitate the release of the father of the player Luis Díaz.” Time has also reported similar information. “Sources from the authorities indicated this Monday morning that uniformed officers in charge of the search operations for Luis Manuel Díaz are withdrawing from the assigned areas,” that medium wrote. As reported last Thursday by the Minister of Defense, Iván Velásquez, Díaz would be in the Serranía del Perijá, a foothills of the Andes Mountains shared by Colombia and neighboring Venezuela.
Last Friday, hours after President Gustavo Petro said that the ELN had “done an act that goes against the peace process itself,” that armed group assured that it had begun the process to free him. “From now on your liberation process begins and we want to avoid any incident,” read a text signed by the Northern War Front of that guerrilla. The front indicated that the responsible command was dedicated to “economic missions” and that the kidnappers did not know that they were kidnapping the father of the famous soccer player. “When it is verified that this is Lucho Díaz’s father, his release is directed because he is a relative of the great athlete that all Colombians love,” the statement explained. However, more than 72 hours later, he remains in the hands of the ELN.
Mane Díaz was kidnapped on October 28 with his wife, Cilenis Marulanda, at a gas station in Barrancas (La Guajira). The soccer player’s mother was released that same day, in the midst of great national and international condemnation for this crime. But his father did not suffer the same fate. He has already gone ten days without freedom, and neither the efforts of the Government nor the calls of his son – who published his own statement this Sunday in which he demanded freedom for his father – have had any effect.
“I ask the ELN for the prompt release of my father,” Lucho Díaz wrote in an emotional letter. “Every second, every minute our anguish grows; My mother, my brothers and I are desperate, distressed and without words to describe what we are feeling. This suffering will only end when we have him back home,” pleaded the English Liverpool player. A day earlier, he had somberly celebrated a goal in a match against Luton Town. In tears, he displayed a T-shirt that he was wearing under his uniform with the phrase: “Freedom for Dad.”
Newsletter
The analysis of current events and the best stories from Colombia, every week in your mailbox
RECEIVE THE
The kidnapping has caused an escalation of tensions between the State and the ELN. The situation occurs in the midst of parallel negotiations between the Government and the various armed groups that remain active in the country within the framework of the total peace policy, one of the most emblematic and ambitious projects of the Petro Administration. That guerrilla, precisely, is the largest and oldest group of those involved in these discussions. The negotiations with the ELN, furthermore, are the most advanced of all. In August, after eight months of talks, a ceasefire came into force that is in effect until February.
The kidnapping strains that agreement and the negotiation in general, which is why last Wednesday the head of the Government delegation at the table, Otty Patiño, traveled to Cuba to meet with the negotiators of that guerrilla. In the following hours, a crisis cabinet was formed in the Nariño Palace, which published a statement in which it demanded the armed group to immediately release Mane Diaz. However, the State has still not been able to recover it.
This situation is one of the two strong blows that the policy of total peace has suffered in the last week. At the same time that it is trying to rescue Díaz’s father, the Government is facing a crisis with another armed group that is involved in the discussions, the FARC dissidents known as the Central General Staff (EMC). This weekend, the EMC published a statement in which it announced “the suspension of the dialogue process and the agenda with the national government,” after a tense tug-of-war over the presence of the military in the town of El Plateado, in the Micay river canyon (Cauca).
Subscribe here to the EL PAÍS newsletter about Colombia and here to the channel on WhatsAppand receive all the information keys on current events in the country.
#ELN #assures #released #Luis #Díazs #father #military #operations #continue