Colombian armed forces commander General Freddy Padilla backed President Alvaro Uribe’s claim to know the exact location of FARC leader Luciano Marin Arango, alias “Ivan Marquez.”
“The Colombians know, and the journalists know, the exact location of ‘Ivan Marquez,’ the Colombian government knows precisely, and the president of the republic knows precisely where he is. No terrorist can be hidden in any country which calls itself democratic,” said the general.
Speaking publicly, President Alvaro Uribe also said Tuesday “We know where ‘Ivan Marquez’ is.”
The announcement follows a massive military operation in which twelve guerrillas were killed and six captured.
The president warned Ivan Marquez that the Colombian government is “not as naïve as he thinks.”
Marquez, a 55-year-old former Patriotic Union MP, joined the FARC in 1985, and is a member of its secretariat. His name is linked to failed attempts on the president’s life in April 2002. In May, new intelligence came to light on the rebel’s whereabouts in the jungle region between the Venezuelan and Colombian borders.
