“Peru is taking action in the Putumayo area to prevent the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) from entering, using aircraft, Putumayo River patrols and infantry patrols,” he said.He added that he had full knowledge that the FARC dips in and out of Peru in so-called “pushes” designed to work around Plan Colombia, a United-States-backed military initiative against the group.”There is no evidence of FARC column sightings or of individuals in uniform or military equipment,” he said. “There has been a lot of speculation, and at times there is a lot of fiction written about the topic. What might have happened could be an infiltration of guerrillas dressed as civilians,” he added.Antero Flores Aráoz described the border as porous, with civilians regularly crossing from one side to the other, children from one nation go to school in another, and indigenous people using barter for trade rather than national currencies.Peru and Colombia share a 1,600-km border and have close communication in places via their armed forces and mechanisms like the so-called “2+2” meetings between the two nations’ foreign and defense ministers.
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