Colombia: Seized FARC documents show group's interest in dirty bomb

Published 6 March 2008

Colombian forces launched an incursion into Ecuador, killing a leading FARC figure and sixteen of his associates; Colombian government says seized documents show FARC’s interest in obtaining radioactive materials

Colombia’s military three days ago launched an air raid on a camp belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) group a mile inside Ecuador, killing seventeen rebels including Raúl Reyes, a senior FARC commander. The political and regional consequences aside, we note that a further dramatic development, Colombia’s vice-president, Francisco Santos, told a UN disarmament forum in Geneva yesterday that the FARC documents also revealed the group was seeking to acquire uranium to build a radioactive “dirty bomb.” Santos presented no evidence to back up the claim. Analysts said that, even if FARC had the ambition to obtain radioactive material, it was very unlikely to have got far with such a plan.