The Interior and Justice Ministry has announced that an ex-guerrilla implicated in the alleged fake demobilization of a FARC front in 2006 is no longer the government’s “Manager of Peace.”
Raul Agudelo Medina, alias “Olivo Saldaña,” will now officially no longer receive any benefits previously granted to him by the government for his demobilization, reaffirming President Juan Manuel Santos’ declaration last week that the government no longer recognizes the re-integration of Saldaña.
Saldaña was appointed manager of peace in March 2009. However, controversy began last week when two ex-guerrillas accused the government of collaborating with Saldaña in 2006 to recruit homeless people to form a ‘FARC’ front solely for the purpose of demobilizing.
Saldaña denies the accusations, saying that the whole process was carried out lawfully by the military and that the front did indeed exist.
Then-peace commissioner, Carlos Restrepo, is also being investigated for his part in the alleged plot.
