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SEGOVIA, COLOMBIA — After 221 days of captivity at the hands of Colombian rebels, Canadian mining executive Gernot Wober is free.
He was handed over Tuesday in an isolated clearing in northern Colombia by rebels of the National Liberation Army (ELN) to a Red Cross delegation and whisked away by helicopter and then plane to Bogota. “He looks good. He’s suffered a lot, but he’s very excited about his liberty,” said Archbishop Dario de Jesus Monsalve, a member of the delegation.
Mr. Wober, vice-president of exploration for Canadian junior mining company Braeval Mining Corporation, was a bargaining chip in a long-standing battle over mining rights between Colombia’s leftist guerillas and its government. Now, his release could have implications for future peace in a country racked by 50 years of violent armed conflict, by opening the door to allow the ELN, Colombia’s second-largest guerrilla group, to the negotiating table.
The Canadian went from being a pawn in the conflict over resources to a possible lynchpin in negotiating peace with one of Latin America’s oldest rebel groups.
Since November, peace talks have been underway in Havana between Colombia’s largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and government negotiators.
The ELN has expressed interest in holding parallel peace talks. But President Juan Manuel Santos repeatedly said the government would not start peace talks with the ELN while it still held Mr. Wober hostage.
Mr. Wober’s release however, “means this impasse will be overcome,” said Carlos Medina Gallego, an author of several books on the ELN and professor of security and defence at the National University of Colombia.
Mr. Wober was abducted Jan. 18 along with three Colombian and two Peruvian geologists in Norosi in a gold-rich region of northern Colombia.
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