The FARC and paramilitary drug lord ‘Cuchillo’ are behind a number of candidates for the 2010 Congress elections, an NGO monitoring the elections has announced.
The Electoral Observation Mission (MOE) warned authorities that Cuchillo, one of the country’s leading drug lords and a paramilitary leader, is behind candidates in the central Colombian Meta department and that the FARC “is looking to hide within leftist parties,” newspaper El Espectador reported Friday.
The organization warns the government not to allow the same situation to develop as in the 2002 and 2006 elections, which led to the investigation of dozens of politicians on all levels of government for their alleged involvement with paramilitary organizations.
The MOE calls on the national government to come up with better guarantees for honest elections.
