Politics

Bogota –  Then-Colombian President Alvaro Uribe authorized "clandestine operations" against leftist FARC guerrillas in Venezuelan territory, according to a 2006 confidential U.S. diplomatic cable published Wednesday by the daily El Espectador.

The cable, one of thousands provided to the Bogota paper by the international non-profit organization WikiLeaks, shows that the conservative Uribe, who governed from 2002-2010, gave the authorization at a time of friendly relations between his government and that of leftist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

According to the diplomatic dispatch, Uribe was "under no illusions about Chavez" and saw "Venezuela's polarizing, anti-U.S. focus as a serious problem."

Nevertheless, the Colombian president preferred "to manage President Chavez rather than confront him" and worked "to maintain a positive bilateral atmosphere, using joint energy projects and trade to create incentives to moderate Chavez's behavior."

But according to El Espectador, "the U.S. Embassy's classified report makes it clear that Uribe's emphasis on engagement over confrontation left open the option of carrying out armed operations in Venezuela to protect Colombia from terrorist attacks."

Citing the cable disseminated by WikiLeaks, the paper noted that the former president authorized "clandestine cross-border operations against the FARC as appropriate, while trying to avoid a repeat of the crisis generated by the capture of FARC official Rodrigo Granda in Caracas in 2003 (sic)."

Granda, a member of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, guerrilla group's International Commission, was captured on Dec. 13, 2004, in Caracas in a clandestine operation arranged by Colombian authorities. He was immediately taken across the border and later to Bogota.

The incident increased tensions between the ideologically opposed governments.

Granda was later released on June 5, 2007, after French President Nicolas Sarkozy persuaded Uribe to do so as part of efforts to secure the release of Franco-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt, who was eventually rescued from her FARC captors in a Colombian military operation in July 2008.

The U.S. Embassy cable cited by El Espectador stated that Uribe used an "outwardly conciliatory approach" to "create the political space to permit clandestine cross border operations against terrorists and narco-traffickers when required."

The cable also cited Uribe adviser Jose Obdulio Gaviria as saying of the former president's strategy: "We are the perfect hypocrites."

The dispatch was one of roughly 16,000 cables that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange provided El Espectador publisher Fidel Cano early this month in London.

The FARC, which has fought a decades-old struggle against a succession of Colombian governments, was weakened and pushed back into more remote jungle and mountain regions, during Uribe's time in office.