The Associated Press is reporting that FARC guerrillas are increasingly crossing the border in Venezuela to purchase food and weapons and continue their trade in cocaine.

From the AP:

Well inside Venezuela, Colombian insurgents rest, train, buy arms and uniforms, recover from wounds and process cocaine, according to the rebel deserters, Venezuelan opposition politicians and Colombian officials.

Some top rebel commanders even raise families and educate their children in Venezuela, deserters told AP.

Colombian rebels were buying weapons and seeking refuge in Venezuela long before Chavez came to power in 1999. But border zone residents say their presence and influence have grown under Venezuela’s leftist leader, principally in the states of Zulia, Tachira, Apure and Chavez’s home state of Barinas.

Inside Colombia, the rebel forces have been seriously weakened by a Colombian military fortified by U.S. training, weapons, satellite intelligence and communications intercepts.

Venezuela’s safe haven has helped to keep their insurgencies alive, particularly because it enables the rebels to extract tons of Colombian cocaine for unhindered shipment to the United States and Europe, according to U.S. and Colombian officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they said they didn’t want to provoke Chavez.

The guerrillas make between $500 million to $1 billion in the cocaine trade.