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Second senior Farc rebel 'killed' | Second senior Farc rebel 'killed' |
(about 4 hours later) | |
The Colombian government says another senior commander of the Farc rebel group has been killed. | |
Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos said Ivan Rios had been killed by his own men. Earlier the army had claimed he had died in combat with its troops. | |
The reported death comes less than a week after another top commander Farc leader, Raul Reyes, was killed by troops in a raid just inside Ecuador. | |
That killing sparked a diplomatic row, with Ecuador denouncing the incursion. | |
Ivan Rios - whose real name was Manuel Munoz Ortiz - was the youngest member of the seven-man secretariat of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or Farc. | |
He is said to have been killed in a mountainous area of the western province of Caldas. | |
Mr Santos said the Farc's chief of security gave Colombian troops the leader's severed hand as proof of his death. It is unclear why he was killed. | |
Recriminations | |
The death came as Latin American leaders exchanged accusations at a regional summit over Saturday's cross-border raid. | The death came as Latin American leaders exchanged accusations at a regional summit over Saturday's cross-border raid. |
Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa condemned Colombian "aggression" in his opening speech in the Dominican Republic. | |
His Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe, responded with claims that Mr Correa had links to Farc rebels and had not co-operated in fighting terrorism. | |
Mr Uribe, who is backed by Washington, has made the military defeat of the Farc a priority. | |
This loss of senior commanders are the latest in a series of blows for the rebels. | |
But the BBC's Jeremy McDermott in Colombia says there is a growing call, both internationally and domestically, for negotiations as the only sure way to end the four-decade conflict. |