The above statement is the response given by the Liberal Party senator Piedad Cordoba to FARC’s letter in which FARC state that they are still awaiting the relevant conditions to be put in place in order to carry out the ‘prisoner exchange’. FARC repeated their willingness to liberate Pablo Emilio Moncayo and Daniel Calvo. The guerrilla movement also announced that they would hand over the remains of Major Julien Ernesto Guevara who died in captivity.

Cordoba added that she ‘is waiting for a similar attitude and understanding of the humanitarian nature of this action to be forthcoming from the national government’.

Regarding the situation as it stands at the moment she gives the following clarification; ‘ My role as mediator in the liberation of hostages and in the humanitarian exchange is subject to the President appointing me officially to the task, and in proposing his conditions for the exchange to take place’.

She adds that in relation to this exchange one must consider ‘the basic position of the FARC: their giving up on their demand for a demilitarised zone in Florida and Pradera, their naming of three spokespersons, their demand for an international element to the exahnge, their demand that Piedad Cordoba be a mediator and the drafting of a security protocol by the two parties concerned’.

Finally she expresses the hope that ‘we the mediators and those directly concerned can keep alive in our minds and in our hearts that which we know is increasing in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of Colombians- an end to the suffering endured by the families of hostages, freedom for those held in captivity and a meaningful search for peace’.