More than 80 people have died in Colombia’s northeastern region after failed attempts to hold peace talks with the National Liberation Army, a Colombian official said.
Twenty other people have been injured, according to William Villamizar, governor of Norte de Santander, where many of the murders occurred.
Among the victims are community leader Carmelo Guerrero and seven people who were seeking to sign a peace agreement, according to a report that a government people’s defense agency published Saturday night.
Authorities said the attacks occurred in several towns located in the Catatumbo region, near the border with Venezuela, and at least three people who were part of the peace talks were kidnapped.
Thousands of people are fleeing the area, with some hiding in the lush mountains nearby or seeking help in government shelters.
Daniel Becerril / REUTERS
Colombia’s military rescued dozens of people on Sunday, including a family and their dog, whose owner held a pack of cold water to the animal’s chest to keep it cool as they evacuated by helicopter.
Defense Minister Iván Velásquez traveled to the northeastern city of Cúcuta on Sunday as officials prepared to send 10 tons of food and hygiene kits to approximately 5,000 people in the communities of Ocaña and Tibú, most of them fleeing the violence.
“Catatumbo needs help,” Villamizar said in a public speech Saturday. “Boys, girls, young people, adolescents, entire families show up with nothing, in trucks, dump trucks, motorcycles, whatever they can, on foot, so as not to be victims of this confrontation.”
The attack comes after Colombia suspended peace talks with the National Liberation Army (ELN) on Friday, the second time it has done so in less than a year.
The Colombian government has demanded that the ELN cease all attacks and allow authorities to enter the region and provide humanitarian aid.
The ELN has been clashing in Catatumbo with former members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, a guerrilla group that dissolved after signing a peace agreement in 2016 with the Colombian government. The two are fighting for control of a strategic border region that has coca leaf plantations.
In a statement on Saturday, the ELN said it had warned former FARC members that if they “continued attacking the population… there was no other way out than armed confrontation.” The ELN has accused former FARC rebels of several murders in the area, including the Jan. 15 murder of a couple and their nine-month-old baby.
Army commander Gen. Luis Emilio Cardozo Santamaría said Saturday that authorities were reinforcing a humanitarian corridor between Tibú and Cúcuta for the safe passage of those forced to flee their homes. He said that special urban troops were also deployed in municipal capitals “where there are risks and a lot of fear.”
The ELN has attempted to negotiate a peace agreement with President Gustavo Petro’s administration five times, but the talks failed after episodes of violence. The ELN’s demands include that it be recognized as a rebel political organization, which critics have said is risky.
