Colombian authorities said on Thursday they have found no evidence so far of “external factors” contributing to the crash on Wednesday of a SATENA Beechcraft 1900 aircraft on the Cúcuta–Ocaña route , which killed all 15 people on board.

The conclusions were presented during a press conference held at Ocaña airport in the northeastern department of Norte de Santander. The briefing was led by Major General Óscar Zuluaga Castaño, president of Colombia’s state-owned airline SATENA, and Jorge Campillo, president of aviation company SEARCA, which operated the aircraft under a charter arrangement. Local officials, including Ocaña’s acting mayor and government secretary Hugo Guerrero, also attended.

The aircraft crashed on Jan. 28 while operating Flight NSE 8849, which departed from Camilo Daza Airport in Cúcuta at 11:42 a.m. local time and was scheduled to land in Ocaña at around 12:05 p.m. Contact with air traffic control was lost at 11:54 a.m. while the plane was flying over the Catatumbo region, a mountainous area long affected by armed conflict and the presence of illegal armed groups.

Authorities confirmed that all 13 passengers and two crew members died in the crash. Among those on board were Congressman Diógenes Quintero and Carlos Salcedo, a candidate for Colombia’s House of Representatives.

Officials said that, at this stage of the investigation, there is no indication that the aircraft was affected by “external factors”. The term refers to events such as the aircraft being struck by a drone or the involvement of a terrorist-related incident, including a bombing.

According to flight-tracking data from FlightRadar24, the Beechcraft 1900 had reached a cruising altitude of approximately 12,000 meters before beginning its approach to Ocaña near the town of Ábrego. The aircraft then descended to about 7,900 meters moments before disappearing from radar. The plane has only been in the air 12 minutes for a 20-minute flight. Authorities said there is still no information regarding the recovery of the aircraft’s flight data recorder or cockpit voice recorder.

SATENA and SEARCA said the aircraft, registration HK-4709, met all airworthiness and maintenance requirements and was operating under approved technical and regulatory standards at the time of the accident. Weather conditions along the route and at the destination airport were described as favorable for flight operations. According to the air traffic controlers at Ocaña, the final words from the cockpit were: “We are ready to descend”.

The pilot in command, Manuel Vanegas, had accumulated more than 10,000 flight hours, while the co-pilot, José Joaquín de la Vega, had logged over 7,000 hours, officials said. Both crew members were operating within the duty-time limits established by Colombia’s aviation regulations, with no indications of fatigue or excessive workload.

The Cúcuta–Ocaña–Medellín route began operations in March 2025 under which SEARCA is responsible for the aircraft, maintenance, crews and insurance. SATENA said SEARCA has provided services to the airline for more than 25 years, with a track record supported by compliance with technical, operational and regulatory standards.

Over the past seven years, SEARCA has transported more than 269,000 passengers across nearly 17,800 flights, accounting for more than 12,400 flight hours, according to SATENA. During 2025 alone, SEARCA conducted more than 7,000 flights on 25 routes, representing 16.5% of SATENA’s total operations.

Officials said all aircraft operated by SATENA and SEARCA are equipped with mandatory terrain awareness and warning systems, as well as additional technology designed to allow safe operations in areas with complex topography, such as the Catatumbo mountain range.

The region where the aircraft went down has seen repeated clashes between the ELN guerrilla and dissident factions of FARC, as well as violence linked to drug trafficking routes and other illicit economies. Authorities said the rugged terrain complicated access for emergency and recovery teams during the initial search and rescue operation.

SATENA said the determination of the cause of the crash will rest exclusively with Colombia’s aviation accident investigation authorities, working alongside the Colombian Aerospace Force and judicial entities. SEARCA said it is fully cooperating with the investigation and will provide all documentation and information requested.

Despite the accident, SATENA confirmed it will not suspend operations on the route, citing its mandate to maintain connectivity to remote regions of the country. The airline said it will continue operating with heightened oversight and coordination with aviation authorities.

SATENA and SEARCA reiterated their condolences to the families of the victims and said providing institutional support and accompaniment to relatives remains a priority as the investigation continues.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on Tuesday that Nicolás Maduro should be returned to Venezuela to face trial in his home country, calling the U.S. military operation that captured the ousted leader in Caracas earlier this month a “kidnapping” that violated Venezuelan sovereignty.

“They have to return him and have him tried by a Venezuelan court, not a U.S. one,” Petro said during a public event in Bogotá, days before a scheduled meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House on Feb. 3.

Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were captured by U.S. forces on Jan. 3 during a military incursion in Caracas and flown to New York, where they face federal charges including drug trafficking, weapons possession and conspiracy. Both pleaded not guilty at an initial court appearance on Jan. 5 and are being held under maximum-security conditions at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. A follow-up hearing is scheduled for March 17.

Petro said the operation lacked a legal basis and risked causing long-lasting damage across Latin America. “No one in their right mind would bomb the homeland of Bolívar,” he said, referring to Venezuelan independence hero Simón Bolívar. “No young man or woman in Latin America will forget that missiles fell on the land of Bolívar.”

The Colombian president framed his remarks as part of a broader critique of U.S. foreign policy and international institutions, reviving rhetoric he has used previously against Trump. He argued that the case should be handled within Venezuela’s judicial system, citing what he described as civilizational differences between Latin America and the Anglo-European world.

“The Latin American civilization is different,” Petro said. “That is why he must be judged there, not in the United States.”

Petro’s comments came during an event announcing the reactivation of Bogotá’s historic San Juan de Dios Hospital, where he appeared alongside Mayor Carlos Fernando Galán. Later in the day, Petro again urged Trump to grant Maduro his freedom or return him to Venezuela, while criticising the United Nations for failing to stop the war in Gaza.

“The way to overcome that failure is not with missiles over the poor,” Petro said. “It is not bombing Caracas.”

The remarks come at a sensitive diplomatic moment, as Petro prepares to travel to Washington after the U.S. government granted him a temporary, five-day visa allowing him to attend the Feb. 3 meeting with Trump. The visa will be valid from Feb. 1 to Feb. 5 and is limited exclusively to the official visit, according to Colombia’s presidency.

Petro’s U.S. visa was withdrawn in September following an unscheduled pro-Palestinian speech he gave in New York during the United Nations General Assembly. On Tuesday, he questioned the decision to reinstate it.

“They took away my visa, now they say they put it back,” Petro said. “Why did they take it away from me? I don’t know if it was for a while or permanently. We’ll know on Feb. 3.”

He described the upcoming meeting with Trump as “determinant,” not only for him personally but “for the life of humanity,” language that underscored both the political symbolism and unpredictability surrounding the encounter.

Colombia’s presidential palace confirmed that the bilateral meeting will take place at 11 a.m. on Feb. 3 inside the White House and said the agenda has been set by the U.S. administration. Officials said the talks aim to stabilise bilateral relations, which have been strained in recent months by disagreements over foreign policy and regional security.

Foreign Minister Rosa Villavicencio will also travel to Washington under the same short-term visa arrangement, ensuring her participation in the official programme, the presidency said.

U.S. authorities have accused Maduro and Flores of overseeing armed groups involved in kidnappings and killings and of receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes linked to narcotics trafficking. The Justice Department has declassified indictments related to weapons possession and conspiracy involving machine guns and destructive devices.

Although U.S. authorities had previously offered rewards of up to $50 million for information leading to Maduro’s capture, Washington said no reward would be paid because the arrest was carried out directly by U.S. forces under Trump’s renewed extraction orders.

Petro did not address the specific charges against Maduro, focusing instead on what he said were the broader legal and moral implications of the operation, as Colombia seeks to balance its relationship with Washington while maintaining its longstanding opposition to foreign military interventions in the region.

On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is due to meet with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado at the State Department. The meeting follows U.S. intelligence assessments raising doubts over whether Venezuela’s interim Chavista-run government would cooperate with the Trump administration by severing ties with close international allies such as Iran, China and Russia. Reuters has reported that CIA Director John Ratcliffe travelled to Caracas on Jan. 15 for talks related to Venezuela’s political future. “I want to be clear with you what I’ve shared publicly. We made multiple attempts to get Maduro to leave voluntarily and to avoid all of this because we understood that he was an impediment to progress. You couldn’t make a deal with this guy,” remarked U.S Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Ecuador has sharply increased tariffs on Colombian crude oil transported through its pipeline system, deepening a trade and energy dispute between the two Andean neighbours that has already disrupted electricity exports and bilateral commerce.

Ecuador said on Tuesday it had raised the tariff paid by Colombia for each barrel of oil transported through the state-owned Trans-Ecuadorian Oil Pipeline System (SOTE) by 900%, lifting the fee from $3 to $30 per barrel. The move came in response to Colombia’s decision to suspend electricity exports to Ecuador from Feb. 1, 2026.

Bogotá has yet to issue an official response to the tariff increase.

The dispute has widened beyond trade into energy cooperation and crude transportation, straining relations between the two countries amid longstanding tensions over border security and cooperation against drug trafficking.

Without explicitly referring to the trade conflict, Colombia’s Ministry of Mines and Energy last week issued a resolution suspending international electricity transactions (TIE) with Ecuador, describing the measure as a preventive step aimed at protecting Colombia’s energy sovereignty and security amid climate-related pressures on domestic supply.

Colombia is a key electricity supplier to Ecuador, particularly during periods of drought. Ecuador has faced prolonged power cuts in recent years, including in 2024 and 2025, in a country where roughly 70% of electricity generation depends on hydropower.

Colombia’s leftist President Gustavo Petro said his country had previously acted in solidarity during Ecuador’s worst drought in decades. “I hope Ecuador appreciated that when it needed us, we responded with energy,” Petro said last week.

Ecuador’s Environment and Energy Minister Inés Manzano said the crude transport tariff increase applied to Colombia’s state oil company Ecopetrol and private firms exporting oil through the SOTE. “We made a change in the tariff value,” Manzano said. “Instead of three dollars, it is now 30 dollars per barrel.”

According to Ecuadorian news outlets, the SOTE transported nearly 10,300 barrels per day of Colombian crude in November, shipped by Ecopetrol and private companies.

Manzano has also said Ecuador will impose new fees on Colombian crude transported through the Oleoducto de Crudos Pesados (OCP) pipeline, citing reciprocity following Colombia’s suspension of electricity exports.

The trade conflict began last week when Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, a close political ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, announced a 30% tariff on imports from Colombia, effective from February. Speaking from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Noboa said the measure was justified by what he described as insufficient cooperation from Bogotá in combating drug trafficking and organised crime along the shared border.

“We have made real efforts of cooperation with Colombia,” Noboa said in a post on social media, adding that Ecuador faces a trade deficit of more than $1 billion with its neighbour. “But while we insist on dialogue, our military continues confronting criminal groups tied to narcotrafficking on the border without cooperation.”

Colombia’s foreign ministry rejected the move as unilateral and contrary to Andean Community (CAN) trade rules, sending a formal protest note to Quito. Bogotá has proposed a high-level ministerial meeting involving foreign affairs, defence, trade and energy officials to de-escalate the dispute, though no date has been confirmed.

Colombia’s Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism (MinCIT) responded by announcing a 30% tariff on 23 Ecuadorian products, which have not yet been specified, with the option to extend the measure to additional goods. Trade Minister Diana Marcela Morales Rojas said the tariff was proportional, temporary and intended to restore balance to bilateral trade.

“This levy does not constitute a sanction or a confrontational measure,” the ministry said in a statement. “It is a corrective action aimed at protecting the national productive apparatus.”

Business groups say Colombia exports mainly electricity, medicines, vehicles, cosmetics and plastics to Ecuador, while importing vegetable oils and fats, canned tuna, minerals and metals. Ecuador’s exporters federation, Fedexpor, said non-oil exports to Colombia rose 4% between January and November last year, with more than 1,130 products entering the Colombian market.

Colombia and Ecuador share a 600-kilometre border stretching from the Pacific coast to the Amazon rainforest, a region where Colombian guerrilla groups and binational criminal organisations operate, including networks involved in drug trafficking, arms smuggling and illegal mining.

Although Quito and Bogotá have both signalled willingness to engage in dialogue, the rapid escalation of tariffs and energy measures has raised concerns among exporters, energy producers and regional analysts about the risk of prolonged disruption to trade and cooperation between two of the Andean region’s closest economic partners.

The school year had barely begun when gunfire forced children in rural northern Colombia to cower under their desks in fear and silence.

On the same day students were returning to classrooms after the Christmas and New Year holidays, fighting between illegal armed groups erupted near Briceño, in the northeast of Antioquia. By nightfall, schools were shut, a rural health post had closed, and families were sheltering under their beds as rifle fire echoed through nearby hills.

Local authorities say at least 28 rural school sites have been forced to close, cutting off education for some 375 children who now remain at home under a temporary non-attendance model. In several villages, students had already arrived at their classrooms when the clashes began, leaving teachers scrambling to keep children indoors and away from windows as shots rang out nearby.

“For these children, school should be a place of safety,” said Mayor Noé de Jesús Espinosa. “Instead, it has become another place of fear.”

Fighting between Clan del Golfo (Gulf Clan) and the 36th Front of FARC dissidents has now drawn-in the state’s security forces. The violence has also shut down the health center in the village of El Roblal, leaving residents without medical care at a time when movement between villages has become too dangerous.

Across at least ten rural communities, daily life has ground to a halt. Public transport and cargo services have been suspended, cutting off supplies of food and medicine. Roughly 500 people are now confined to their homes, many lying on the floor or hiding beneath their beds to protect themselves from bullets and explosive shockwaves.

“In some houses, entire families are sleeping under their beds,” Espinosa said. “They don’t know when the shooting will start again.”

Fear has already driven at least 23 families to flee their homes. Carrying only what they could gather in minutes, they arrived in Briceño’s town center seeking refuge with relatives and friends. Municipal officials are now coordinating emergency aid, while warning that more displacement is likely if the fighting continues.

The violence is rooted in a territorial dispute over the Cauca River canyon, a strategic corridor connecting Antioquia’s Bajo Cauca region with the west of the department. Military intelligence and local sources say the escalation follows an order by alias “Gonzalito,” identified as a senior commander of the Clan del Golfo, to eliminate alias “Primo Gay,” leader of the dissident 36th Front, and seize control of the area.

For residents, however, the strategic calculations of armed groups mean little. What they feel is the constant fear — the uncertainty of whether children can return to school, whether the sick can reach a clinic, and whether families will be forced to flee again.

Army units from the Fourth Brigade are advancing cautiously toward villages such as El Roblal, slowed by the presence of improvised explosive devices and suspected minefields planted along rural paths. The risk has made it difficult for troops — and humanitarian assistance — to reach many isolated communities.

Antioquia Governor Andrés Julián Rendón has urged the national government to maintain a permanent military presence in the area, warning against further troop withdrawals.

“Peasant communities in Antioquia’s most remote regions deserve to live without fear,” Rendón said, recalling that promises made last year to keep troops in Briceño were later reversed.

The trauma is not new. In October, more than 2,000 people — roughly a quarter of Briceño’s population — were forced to flee 18 rural villages after threats from armed groups. Many slept for days in the town’s main square and urban school, unsure if they would ever return home.

As indiscriminate violence once again targets the country’s most vulnerable and forces families to lock themselves inside their homes, residents fear the humanitarian crisis will deepen across Antioquia, just months before Colombians are due to cast their votes in the May 31 presidential election.