Full title: 'The Farc Files: Venezuela, Ecuador and the Secret Archive of  'Raúl Reyes' is coming out next month and some here maybe interested.

The IISS advert:
This Strategic Dossier provides unique insights into the thinking and evolution of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). It is based on a study of the computer disks belonging to Luis Edgar Devía Silva (aka Raúl Reyes), head of FARC’s International Committee (COMINTER), that were seized by Colombian armed forces in a raid in March 2008 on Devía’s camp inside Ecuador.

It shows how FARC evolved from a small, autarkic and strategically irrelevant group into an insurgent movement which, fuelled by revenues from narcotics production, came close to jeopardising the survival of the Colombian state. A key part of FARC’s evolution was the development of an international strategy aimed at acquiring financial support, arms and political legitimacy. The dossier looks in detail at FARC’s relations with Venezuela and Ecuador.
Link:http://www.iiss.org/publications/str...-of-ral-reyes/

In an email some more details:
In the early hours of 1 March 2008 Colombian forces launched Operation Phoenix, an assault on a jungle camp of the country's largest insurgent group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). The operation killed one of the group's leading members - Luis Edgar Devía Silva, better known as 'Raúl Reyes' - and over 20 other FARC operatives and camp visitors.

Operation Phoenix plunged Colombia's diplomatic relations with Venezuela and Ecuador into crisis - and not only because the camp had been located almost 2km inside the latter's territory. Along with Reyes' body, Colombia retrieved a metal briefcase with eight data-storage devices holding an archive of sensitive FARC correspondence and documents. The government wasted no time in releasing selected FARC emails to the media, claiming they provided evidence of official Venezuelan and Ecuadorian complicity with the group.

The Colombian government subsequently obtained confirmation from the International Criminal Police Organisation (INTERPOL) that the archive had not been manipulated following its capture and exploited the operational leads that it provided over the following months. However, the vast majority of the information that it contained remained classified. Until now.

Several months after Operation Phoenix, senior officials from the Colombian Ministry of Defence invited the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) to conduct an independent analysis of the material. IISS researchers were granted unrestricted access to the archive and, since then, have exercised sole control over the research and publication process and the nature of the conclusions reached.
(Mod's Note:It was this that prompted merging the threads).