President Andres Pastrana and Mr Manuel Marulanda, the 70-year-old guerrilla chief, emerged from 15 hours of talks last week to announce that the suspended Colombian peace negotiations would resume. The two-day summit took place in the demilitarised zone controlled by the Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia (FARC).
After weeks of rising anxiety, with the deadline for the FARC's control over the DMZ set to expire at midnight, the two leaders presented a joint 13point document that called for fresh talks to discuss a cessation of hostilities.
"Today the peace process has returned to life," an elated Mr Pastrana said. As the two men exchanged bear hugs before TV cameras, the President announced the extension of the DMZ for a further eight months.
The Los Pozos agreement, named after the jungle village where the meeting was held, sets out goals to reduce the violence that has plagued the peace negotiations and insulate the talks against breakdowns.
The accord calls for a swift exchange of ill security force and guerrilla prisoners and for the formation of two sub-commissions to buttress the negotiators.
The first will advise on ways to combat right-wing paramilitary groups, and "humanise" the conflict, a code word for reducing violations such as civilian kidnappings, recruitment of minors and the use of nonconventional weapons by the FARC; the second will investigate any obstacles that arise to threaten the continuation of the talks.
International observers have been invited to attend the talks for the first time. They will also ensure that, as specified in the accord, the DMZ is used exclusively for peaceful purposes. Furthermore, Mr Marulanda confirmed that the FARC would not oppose official programmes to eradicate drug crops manually.
This week the FARC offered early evidence that the Los Pozos agreement has indeed changed the dynamic. As the talks reopened on Wednesday, on a thrice-weekly schedule designed to speed up the process, Mr Jorge Briceno, the hardline commander-in-chief of FARC's peasant army, surrendered 62 teenage guerrillas to representatives of UNICEF.
According to the director of the government's programme for reincorporating rebel deserters into civilian life, 50 more children will be released from the FARC's ranks "within a few days" and a further 500 are expected.
According to the first national poll taken since Mr Marulanda and Mr Pastrana signed the Los Pozos agreement, Colombians' confidence in the two-year peace process has revived.