DESPERATE BATTLE
FARC is regarded as a terrorist group by the US and the EU and is thought to be holding up to 3,000 hostages in the country's eastern jungles. But Stone refused to condemn it outright.
"I do think that by the standards of Western civilization they go too far; they kidnap innocent people. On the other hand, they're fighting a desperate battle against highly financed, American-supported forces who have been terrorizing the countryside for years and kill most of the people. FARC is fighting back as best it can and grabbing hostages is the fashion in which they can finance themselves and try to achieve their goals, which are difficult. They're a peasant army; I see them as a Zapata-like army. I think they are heroic to fight for what they believe in and die for it, as was Castro in the hills of Cuba," he said.
FARC has said its intention to release the two women hostages still stands but it has returned to an intractable demand -- the demilitarization of two municipalities in southwestern Colombia to negotiate an exchange of the hostages for jailed rebels. Uribe has repeatedly refused that demand and, given his apparent political victory in the case of the boy Emmanuel, is unlikely to change his position any time soon.
IN VAIN
As they waited in vain for the handover, Chavez quipped that Stone was Bush's emissary; Stone in return called Chavez a "great man."
Asked to explain this description, he said: "Because he's really made a difference. You sense a revolutionary spirit throughout Venezuela. He doesn't seem like a tyrant to me at all, he doesn't seem even like a strongman, he seems like a man who respects the law. He's abided by the Constitution far faster than Bush has abided by our Constitution."
Stone also said that he was impressed with the socialist President at close quarters.
"America has heavily invested in publicizing anything negative about Chavez, but I have to admire him in person as an honest man, a strong man and a soldier," he said.
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