Dissidents from the defunct FARC and ELN guerrillas intensified their terrorist attacks on the first weekend of December, a long weekend during which the traditional Candlelight Night is celebrated. Violent attacks in different regions of Colombia left at least two dead and dozens injured. President Gustavo Petro assured in his speech
The first of the attacks occurred on the afternoon of Saturday, December 6, in the municipality of Balboa, in the province of Cauca, in southwest Colombia. There, a group of dissidents from the defunct FARC guerrillas, part of the so-called Carlos Patiño Front, detonated a motorcycle loaded with explosives in the municipal park in front of the police station. The explosion left 14 people seriously injured, including a seven-year-old girl who was playing in the park.
Defense Minister Retired Gen. Pedro Sánchez condemned the attack and offered a reward. “The cowards of the cartel alias Mordisco, as well as alias Marlon, respond with terrorism and attack communities because our operations weaken them,” he wrote in “This attack would constitute a new violation of international humanitarian law, in particular by disregarding the principle of distinction, which requires protection and respect for the civilian population. Far from it, it is an indiscriminate attack which harmed the life and integrity of civilians and caused damage to civilian property, in particular to the mayor’s headquarters, homes and commercial premises,” we can read in the press release.
According to the entity, the attack is part of a struggle for control of key territory for drug trafficking and other illicit economies. “Balboa and Patía constitute a coca-producing enclave in Cauca and are part of a region also affected by illegal mining. Daily violence and repeated violations of the rights of its inhabitants respond to conflicts over the control of illicit economies which, in addition, seriously affect nature through deforestation and contamination of water sources.”
The second violent event occurred on the other side of the country, in the city of Cúcuta, capital of Norte de Santander, in the early hours of Sunday December 7. There, according to local authorities, ELN guerrilla militiamen carried out several simultaneous attacks. They placed explosives in at least three electricity pylons, attacked a police station in the neighboring municipality of Villa del Rosario and attacked a police patrol in the La Concordia neighborhood. Two uniformed officers died there: Mayor Franklyn Alfonso Guerrero and Deputy Mayor Jairo Andrés Holguín Calderón. In addition, the explosive wave of attacks hit the car in which gymnast and Olympic medalist Jossimar Calvo and his wife were traveling.
Calvo’s coach, Jairo Ruiz, explained in the media that the athlete had been treated and was stable. “From the terrorist attack that gymnast Jossimar Orlando Calvo Moreno suffered last night, fortunately he emerged unscathed. He has no dangerous injuries, only the blow, the impact. The car in which they were traveling is completely destroyed.” The Director General of Police, General William Rincón, assured in an official statement that the attacks in the border area with Venezuela would be a response to the military offensive. “The first lines of investigation indicate that these events would be reprisals by the ELN against the offensive actions carried out by the National Police against its criminal structures.”
The last of the attacks took place on Sunday afternoon, in the rural area of the municipality of Chaparral, Tolima, in the center of the country. There, members of other so-called dissidents fired rifles at police officers stationed in the town of El Limón, a few miles from the city’s urban center. Governor Adriana Magaly Matiz condemned, saying that it is a direct attack on the tranquility of an entire territory. “These illegal armed groups intend to silence the community through terror, but they will not succeed. Total rejection. It is not possible that in the middle of 2025, we will relive the same scenes of war that marked our worst decades,” he wrote on his X account.
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