By
Associated Press
BOGOTA, Colombia - President Bush's refusal to send an envoy to upcoming peace talks with leftist rebels is stirring criticism in Colombia and prompting an examination of the U.S. role in the war-torn country.
Critics fault Washington for providing combat helicopters and army trainers under a $1.3 billion anti-narcotics package, while boycotting negotiations to end the South American country's conflict.
But others applauded Bush for declining to send a U.S. envoy to a March 8 meeting with other foreign envoys and rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. They say the United States has no business dealing with guerrillas who make huge profits from the drug trade and have kidnapped and killed American citizens during a 37-year struggle.
Visiting Washington this week, Colombian President Andres Pastrana urged the United States to participate in the upcoming meeting between the government, guerrillas and diplomats from dozens of countries and the United Nations. Bush declined, saying the talks are "an issue that the Colombian people and the Colombian president can deal with."
Bush was also maintaining a prohibition imposed under former President Clinton on U.S. contacts with the FARC. The ban came after rebels killed three American pro-Indian activists in Colombia in March 1999.
Pastrana said yesterday that there had been a misunderstanding, and the United States had never been directly invited to the talks.
"We never invited the U.S. to be in the talks. There was a lot of misinformation," Pastrana told The Associated Press during a visit to Malaysia. "It was not an invitation to participate directly on the negotiating table."
Pastrana is trying to solidify international support for peace talks that have been his administration's top priority.
Ciro Ramirez, the president of Pastrana's Conservative Party, urged Bush Wednesday to reconsider.
"The United States is the world's power," Ramirez said on national radio here. "We hope ... the United States will change its mind in the coming days because it would be important to have them as monitors and verifiers of the peace process."
FARC chief Manuel Marulanda said the group had already confessed and apologized for its role in the killings of the Americans, and punished the guilty rebels.
"If (the United States) does not want to come and speak with us, there's nothing more to do other than extend the invitation," Marulanda told reporters Wednesday in Los Pozos, the southern village where the March meeting will be held.
While keeping its distance from the peace process, Washington is fortifying Colombia's military. The $1.3 billion aid package is financing an offensive into guerrilla-dominated regions where cocaine production flourishes.
"The message received in Colombia will be that the United States has limitless resources and political will where military aid is concerned, but is unwilling even to take symbolic action to support Colombia's peace process," the Center for International Policy, a liberal Washington think tank, said in a statement criticizing Bush's decision.
Daniel Garcia Pena, a former government peace envoy, said he believes the FARC is genuinely interested in improving its relations with Washington.
"The United States has a role to play in the peace process that nobody else can play," Garcia Pena said.
