QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa denied yesterday that he ever received funds from Colombian rebel group FARC, and said a video claiming he did was “a set up.”
A top FARC leader said in a video aired on Colombian television on Friday that the guerrillas donated cash to Correa’s presidential campaign.
During his weekly media address, Correa vehemently denied that he ever got money from the FARC, which is branded a terrorist group by Washington, and said the video is part of a regional bid to destabilize left-leaning governments. “This campaign, is not only taking place in Colombia, it’s happening in the region, where the right has launched an attack, and they are using… all the weapons they have, among them, the media, to destabilize progressive governments,” he said.
“This is a set up to hurt the country’s image, the image of the government,” he said.
Correa is part of a group of leftist presidents in Latin America, including Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia, who are turning their backs on Washington and implementing reforms to tighten the state’s grip on the economy.
Correa has called the media “one of the worst enemies” that leftist Latin American governments face.
The Colombian attorney general’s office said on Friday that police were investigating the statements in the video by Jorge Briceno Suarez, known as “Mono Jojoy,” chief military commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish initials FARC.
