Three Irishmen charged with teaching Marxist rebels how to build bombs made a surprise visit to a Colombian court yesterday to read their lengthy court records.
Escorted by heavily-armed police, Niall Connolly, Jim Monaghan and Martin McCauley arrived at a Bogota courtroom, one week after they refused to leave their jail cells to attend a scheduled court hearing in the same building, which led the judge to postpone the hearing.
The three men, who deny being IRA members, justified their refusal to appear in court last week saying they fear they will not get a fair trial because of political pressure from the U.S. and Colombian governments. Colombia is torn by a 38-year-old guerrilla war that kills thousands every year.
"The three Irishmen came to read their court records. There is nothing more to say," defence lawyer Jose Luis Velasco said, minutes after the trio left the heavily-guarded building in a police van.
Velasco said they spent seven hours reading through the 2,000-odd-page document in Spanish and that they are still considering whether to show up at the court on Oct. 16. Only Connolly, a former representative in Cuba of Sinn Fein, can read in Spanish.
In the event the men fail to appear before the court again, the judge can go ahead with the case, judicial sources said.
The three were arrested last year trying to leave Colombia. They have denied charges they taught bomb-making techniques to rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, Latin America's oldest and largest rebel force known in Spanish as "FARC."
If found guilty, the men face up to 20 years in prison.