Good news for Luis Diaz, the Colombian Liverpool player: his father, kidnapped 14 days ago in Colombia by the ELN guerrillas, was released on Thursday November 9.
Certainly Luis Diaz, the Liverpool player, suffered a defeat, 3 goals to 2, Thursday November 9, against Toulouse in the Europa League, but that does not prevent the Colombian winger from being on cloud nine. Just a few hours before the meeting, he learned of the release of his father, kidnapped on October 28 in Colombia, in a gas station, by the guerrillas of the ELN, National Liberation Army.
A liberation that makes the headlines
This release also made the headlines of the Colombian media,like the RTVC television channel, which followed the arrival of Luis Manuel Diaz by helicopter to the northern town of Valledupar, then transferred by car to his home in Barrancas, near the border with Venezuela.
The one we call “Mané”, 56 years old, coach of an amateur football club, was theIberian thanks to the work of the humanitarian commission of the Church and the UN, which oversees negotiations between the guerrillas and the government.
Waited on his arrival at his home by a crowd of sympathizers brandishing drums and trumpets, Luis Manuel Diaz appeared emaciated and weakened, but in good health. He spent “four days of walking when they held him and two days when they were going to put him back“, Monsignor Francisco Ceballos, member of the group that welcomed him, told the media.
Military deployment
“Mané” has a few words thanked all those who had supported him during this ordeal. His wife, Cilenis Marulanda, kidnapped at the same time as him by armed men riding on motorcycles, was released just a few hours after the attack.
Special forces had been deployed to search for Mr. Díaz in the La Guajira region, a mountain range straddling the two countries. Before withdrawing its soldiers, at the request of the ELN, to facilitate the release. Police also offered a $48,000 reward for information leading to his whereabouts.
Some 245 kidnappings since the start of the year
This kidnapping endangered the peace process, because it broke the “trust“, in the words of the head of state, who had settled between the Colombian authorities and the guerrillas. It has been more than a year since the two parties negotiated peace; a ceasefire is even in force since August 3. Frail hope in a conflict which has lasted for 60 years and has killed at least 450,000 people.
Since the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) began to lay down their arms in 2016 (with the exception of a faction of around 3,500 men who splintered), the ELN is the last guerrilla army of the country and has never stopped kidnappings. This is what allows it to finance itself thanks to ransoms, in addition to money from drug trafficking.
Some 245 kidnappings were recorded between January and September. According to official sources, around thirty people are still in the hands of Guevarist fighters.
But do this “cut” with the father of a player who is a member of the world football elite, “was a mistake”, admitted Antonio Garcia, the military commander of the ELN. The delegation in charge of negotiations with the faction said in a statement that the kidnapping “should never have happened“.
The world of football welcomes the good news
The Colombian Football Federation, one of the most important sports organizations in the country, thanked “the government, the armed forces and the national police, as well as all the institutions and officials who made the release of Luis Manuel Díaz possible“.
Jurgen Klopp, Liverpool coach, was also pleased. Luis Diaz, 26, one of the most talented players on the Colombian national team, who was not selected for the previous match, the day after his parents were kidnapped, was able to announce his tenure after the announcement of his father’s release.
Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s first left-wing president and himself a former guerrilla, pledged to abandon his predecessor’s militarist method of disarming.through dialogue“the last rebels: FARC dissidence, ELN, paramilitary groups and criminals. This release will perhaps put the peace process back on track.
After the release of Mr. Díaz’s father, the government delegation leading the peace talks demanded in a statement that the ELN immediately release all those it “still held in captivity“and put an end to his practice of kidnappings.”It is ethically untenable to argue that the trade in human beings is legal, even under conditions of armed conflict“.