Jorge Enrique Botero

Correspondent

The newspaper La Jornada
Tuesday, August 13, 2024, p. 26

Bogotá. Sixty-six soldiers who were holding some 600 peasants in the Colombian department of Guaviare were released yesterday.

The military forces reported this afternoon that After more than 72 hours, the soldiers, belonging to the Omega Task Force, began to leave the area where they were.

The parade of the military guarded by members of the Peasant Guard, armed with sticks, leaving the areas where they were carrying out aggressive patrols, was preceded by statements by the Minister of Defense, Iván Velázquez, who threatened the guerrillas of the so-called Central General Staff (EMC) with breaking the ceasefire in force until October 15 if the soldiers were not released.

Calarcathe top EMC leader, replied to the minister that the guerrillas had no connection with the events, stressing that the retention of the soldiers was a decision of the peasants, fed up with the aggressiveness of the public force during patrols.

The governor of Guaviare, Johny Rojas, along with officials from the UN and OAS missions were guarantors during the handover of the soldiers, who –the Joint Task Force announced– will return as soon as possible to the same tasks they were performing.

According to military commanders in Guaviare, the military operations are intended to discourage an unprecedented increase in extortion against cattle ranchers and merchants in the department, the gateway to the Colombian Amazon.