I've lost contact with Colombian rebels: Chavez

CARACAS - President Hugo Chavez said a hostage deal with Colombian rebels "has turned very difficult" because he lost all contact with FARC guerrillas, a day after meeting with an optimistic former US official.
"We've lost contact with FARC. We had developed a contact system and that has been destroyed," Chavez said on his weekly radio program, "Alo Presidente," speaking about his meeting Saturday with former US envoy to the United Nations Bill Richardson.
Chavez's pessimism was echoed by FARC commander Ivan Marquez, who in an interview published in Argentine newspaper Perfil said any hope of hostage releases by his group were dashed by Colombia's recent killing of FARC's second-in-command Raul Reyes.
Chavez and Richardson discussed ongoing attempts to get the Colombian government and the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia to negotiate a swap deal exchanging 39 prominent rebel hostages for 500 FARC rebels in Colombian and US jails.
Chavez, who managed to get six FARC hostages released earlier this year, has been in disagreement with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, who refuses to meet FARC demands that he demilitarize an area of Colombia to hold negotiations.
Richardson, currently the governor of the US state of New Mexico, "came to speak about three Americans held captive by FARC and about the issue of the humanitarian process (prisoner swap), which has turned very difficult," Chavez said on his program.
"However, I told him we're ready to help," Chavez said, adding that he hoped "better opportunities" would arise in future to clinch a swap.
Richardson, who is trying to obtain the release of three State Department contractors captured by guerrillas in 2003, said after meeting with Chavez that he was convinced the presidents of Colombia and Venezuela "should be key" in a prisoner swap.
Chavez said Saturday that after all that happened in recent months, a prisoner swap deal had become "an internal Colombian issue."
FARC commander Marquez said in his interview that the death of Reyes was "a very hard blow" to his organization.
Reyes was killed during a March 1 Colombian bombing raid on a FARC camp inside Ecuador that touched off a week-long diplomatic row between the two neighbors, in which Chavez took Ecuador's side.
"He was a very valuable commander, who fell while searching for paths to a political solution to the prisoners of war situation in Colombia," Marquez said, referring to jailed FARC rebels.
In their nearly five-decade struggle to topple the Colombian government, FARC rebels have been seeking international recognition as a legitimate fighting force, instead of being listed as terrorists by the United States, Europe and Colombia.