FARC to hand over remaining minors in group

By Richard McColl

BOGOTA, Colombia

FARC guerrillas will complete various deadlines Tuesday, including its formal disarmament and disclose to the government a full list of assets.

The final containers of weapons belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and received by United Nations’ observers leave will leave the 26 zones of transition across the country where the guerrillas have been grouped since they signed a peace deal with the government that ended almost 53 years of conflict.

FARC will also hand-over an estimated 53 juveniles who remained in its who range in age from 15 and 18, to members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

“Today the final group of minors remaining in the FARC encampments must be handed over,” Interior Minister Guillermo Rivera said in an interview with Blu Radio. “Both on Monday and today the ICRC has been overseeing the operation to receive and ensure that these juveniles are placed in a government reintegration program,” he continued.

So far, 88 children have been handed over by the FARC as part of the peace accords signed in 2016. Half have now been returned to their families.

“If the Colombian Institute for Child Welfare establishes that these children can return home, they will be returned to their families,” Rivera said. “If their family environment is not appropriate, then they will remain in state custody.”

This new phase of deadlines for the FARC includes the disclosure of assets -- land, cattle, farms and bank accounts. But that may be more challenging, however, as the FARC could be reluctant to disclose everything because of recent security risks to members.

Seven of the FARC have been assassinated since the group began its disarmament in January.

“We can consider that the FARC is now disappearing as a guerrilla group and becoming ordinary citizens,” Ariel Ávila, who heads the Colombian non-profit Foundation for Peace and Reconciliation, told French media Tuesday.

The FARC will become a political party beginning Sept. 1, when it will make public its new name and become involved in the 2018 presidential elections.

The peace agreement guarantees the FARC at least 10 uncontested seats in Congress and the Senate for eight years.