President Gustavo Petro this Sunday ordered offensive actions against the Clan del Golfo, the largest drug trafficking ring in Colombia, to resume for attacks against the civilian population and public troops, prompting him to suspend the ceasefire.
The organization with which it had signed a ceasefire since December 31 is, according to the government, behind intimidation and attacks on residents in the northwest of the country.
“I have ordered the Public Force to reactivate all military operations against the Clan del Golfo,” the president wrote on Twitter.
The Gulf Clan’s rifle attack on the available police force breaks the ceasefire.
As of this writing, there is no ceasefire with the golf clan. The public power must act immediately against the structures of the mafia organization.
— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) March 19, 2023
This Sunday, Defense Minister Iván Velásquez assured that the Clan also shot an army patrol with a rifle.
On the eve of the new year, Petro announced a bilateral truce with the Clan del Golfo, National Liberation Army (ELN) guerrillas, FARC dissidents who did not take advantage of the 2016 peace agreement, and a Sierra Nevada paramilitary group from Santa Marta.
The measure was the first step towards negotiating with the main illegal armed actors in the country, which continues to be plagued by violence despite the disarmament of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
But two of the ceasefires failed: the ELN denied reaching such an agreement with the government, and now the government has terminated the pact with the Clan del Golfo.
This gang of paramilitary origin is accused of being behind demonstrations by illegal miners that have been terrorizing the inhabitants of Bajo Cauca, in the department of Antioquia, since March 2, after public forces set fire to the dredges they use to extract gold.
“The armed forces and the police have sufficient capacity not only to carry out these offensive operations ordered by the president, but also to provide security to the population,” said Minister Velásquez.
Surrounded by the military and police leadership, Velásquez warned the Clan and assured that the executive is ready to send more uniformed officers to join the 10,000 already deployed in Bajo Cauca.
Reversal of “Total Peace”
The suspension of the ceasefire is one of the biggest setbacks for the ‘Total Peace’ plan, the policy by which Colombia’s first left-wing president wants to end the internal conflict.
According to official calculations, the Clan del Golfo annually exports some 700 tons of drugs from Colombia, the world’s largest producer of cocaine.
The violence of the guerrillas and paramilitaries who collaborate with drug traffickers has prevented the end of the armed conflict that the country has been experiencing for almost six decades and has left more than 9 million victims, most of them displaced and killed.
The top leader of the Clan del Golfo, “Otoniel”, was captured and extradited to the United States in October 2021 in the following May.
After his arrest, members of the Clan killed at least 20 police officers.
Alias ”Siopas,” one of the men closest to “Otoniel,” was found dead on a highway in early March, apparently the victim of his own associates.
Source: Eluniverso
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