Colombia President Juan Manuel Santos on Thursday said there is “no veto” on who the FARC negotiators are but that the process has to “be realistic,” according to newspaper El Espectador.
Santos said he had total respect for the final decision on delegates to be sent by the FARC to the peace negotiations that will start in Norway on October 8th.
The presidential statement came as the Colombian guerrillas announced their delegates in Cuba’s capital Havana on Thursday morning. “There is no type of veto for the negotiators,” said the president.
However in response to the FARC request that Ricardo Palmera, alias “Simon Trinidad,” be one of the negotiators, Santos said the “process has to realistic and this is very important for there are things that we can do and others we can’t.”
Palmera is currently serving a 60-year sentence in the U.S. for conspiracy and kidnapping. The FARC leader was also allegedly involved in the 2002 murder of a young boy accused of being an informant for the army. According to reports the child’s body, stuffed with explosives and gift-wrapped, was then delivered to Colombian police.
In his statement, the Colombian president said that nothing had been mentioned about the releasing of the guerrilla chief in conversations with U.S. President Barack Obama.
