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BOGOTA — Colombian voters showed lukewarm support for peace talks with guerrillas on Sunday by giving the country’s president a majority in Congress, but also electing his conservative rival, ex-president Alvaro Uribe, to the senate.
President Juan Manuel Santos, who took office in 2010 after serving as the popular Uribe’s defence minister, is engaged in talks with Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) rebels aimed at ending their half-century insurgency.
Uribe, who vehemently opposed the talks when they opened in late 2002 in Cuba, was elected senator on Sunday with strong support.
Nevertheless Santos’ centre-right coalition won 47 of the 102 senate seats, according to official returns with nearly all of the votes counted. — AFP.
derick.khumalo