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Colombian Rebel Commander Killed
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For the government of President ¿lvaro Uribe, and by extension its benefactor, the United States, Devia's death was seen as validation of a strategy that centers on improving the military's capacity by beefing up the army and improving intelligence. The Uribe administration has received more than $4.2 billion, mostly in military aid, from the United States.
On Saturday morning, Uribe was late for a breakfast meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez and seven members of Congress who had traveled to Colombia to discuss trade issues. After arriving at the meeting, in a hotel in the city of Medellin, Uribe explained the importance of the strike to the American lawmakers.
"He put in context the nature of Reyes and how significant he was," Rep. Peter Roskam (R-Ill.) said by phone from Colombia. "He told us that some of the generals he'd been in touch with earlier in the day had gotten emotional and teared up."
Santos, the defense minister, said the operation against Devia was launched after the security forces learned that he and other rebels were in a camp in Putumayo, an isolated jungle state that hugs Colombia's southern border with Ecuador. Military helicopters arrived at the camp at 12:25 a.m. Saturday and took gunfire from the other side of the river, in Ecuador, the defense minister said.
The soldiers fired back and Brazilian-made Super Toucan fighters were called in to attack the rebels, he said. They reportedly killed 17, among them Reyes and Guillermo Torres, a commander also known as a singer-songwriter.
The fighters dropped bombs on the FARC, and then soldiers crossed the frontier into Ecuador and recovered the bodies. A picture of Devia's battered body appeared later in the day in El Tiempo, Bogota's largest newspaper.
Uribe called Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa on Saturday morning to inform him about the firefight on the border. Ecuador has strongly criticized Colombia for military operations near the border, but Correa's public comments after talking to Uribe were muted.
In Venezuela, though, Ch¿vez said Bogota "violated I don't know how many international laws." He also warned that if the Colombian military entered Venezuela, there could be war. "Is Colombia going to become the Israel of the Americas?" Ch¿vez said in comments carried by the Telesur network.
