Totó la Momposina at the Sala Barts, Barcelona. Image credit: Dani Alvarez via Flickr
Colombia is mourning the death of legendary singer and dancer Totó la Momposina, the artist who carried the rhythms of the Caribbean coast to audiences around the world.
Totó’s death was disclosed in a statement by Colombia’s Ministry of Culture today, which described her as “the eternal master”, praising her decades-long contribution to Cumbia, Porro, Mapalé and Bullerengue music.
Her family confirmed that Totó died on Sunday, May 17, in Celaya, Mexico at age 85, after years battling neurocognitive health complications.
Born Sonia Bazanta Vides in 1940 in Talaigua Nuevo, Bolívar, near the historic river town of Mompox, Totó devoted her life to preserving and promoting traditional Caribbean music rooted in African, Indigenous and Spanish influences.
For more than six decades, Totó became the voice of Colombia’s Caribbean soul. Raised in a musical family — her father was a drummer and her mother a singer and dancer — she began performing at an early age before later studying folklore and music in Bogotá, Paris and Cuba.
In 1982, she accompanied Gabriel García Márquez to Stockholm during his Nobel Prize ceremony, where she performed Colombian Caribbean music before international dignitaries — a moment that became part of the country’s cultural history.
Her international breakthrough came with the 1993 album La Candela Viva, released through Peter Gabriel’s Real World label, which introduced global audiences to the song “El Pescador” and to authentic Colombian rhythms.
Over the years, Totó collaborated with and influenced artists across genres, while her music was sampled by international musicians including Jay-Z and Major Lazer. Her song “Latinoamérica” alongside Calle 13 won her two Latin Grammy Awards in 2011. She officially retired from performing in 2022 due to health complications.
Totó received numerous honors throughout her career, including the Womex Award in 2006, Colombia’s Life and Work Award in 2011, and the Latin Grammy Award for Musical Excellence in 2013.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro honored the singer in a post on X today, calling her “an exalted figure of Colombian Caribbean art and culture,” adding, “may she fly high to the stars.”
Her family also announced that a tribute honoring the singer-songwriter will be held on May 27 at the National Capitol in Bogotá, as the country prepares to bid farewell to one of the most influential voices in its cultural history.
Clarito Moreno holds a picture of her missing daughter. Image credit: @clarita_moreno23 via instagram
On May 13, Claribel Moreno was found dead in a rural area of Jamundí, Valle del Cauca, after spending almost five years dedicated to searching for her daughter demanding truth, justice, and reparations.
Moreno was shot four times while riding a motorcycle, according to authorities, who added that investigations into who the shooting are ongoing.
Activist groups say the killing highlights the pattern of violence against women in Colombia and the perils of seeking truth and justice.
Moreno’s daughter, Natalia Buitrago, was 22 when she disappeared in Cartagena on August 18, 2021, after reportedly traveling with friends and her husband to celebrate her birthday.
Moreno accused Natalia’s husband, Hernán Darío Jiménez, of being behind her disappearance, citing a history of domestic violence. She highlighted alleged inconsistencies and contradictions in his testimony and said that years earlier he had been arrested in Mexico City for involvement in a drug trafficking network.
According to a statement from feminist collectives supporting Moreno’s search for justice, there is evidence that plane tickets were purchased in Natalia’s name and that she had left the country. It also alleged thauit immigration authorities and other state entities have not responded to this matter.
Moreno conducted her own investigation: she traveled to Cartagena, Bogotá, and Pereira to gather testimonies and information in the hope of clarifying what happened and finding her daughter. She always stressed that she believed her daughter had been a victim of human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation.
Following that, she said she faced threats and physical attacks, which forced her other daughter to leave the country. Moreno denounced this harassment to the media and in congressional hearings, as well as criticizing what she described as failures in the investigations, as well as institutional and state abandonment and revictimization.
“I feel that the Colombian State abandoned me throughout this process, in this search. Today I call on all of you who are present here to help me in this search and not to leave all the mothers forgotten, nor our daughters. My daughter Natalia deserves to be searched for, she deserves to be found,” she said in a congressional hearing.
As part of the search for her daughter, Moreno created social media accounts such as TikTok and Instagram to raise awareness about the case. She danced like her daughter in videos explaining the case and embraced youthful audiovisual languages to help the message reach more people. Moreno became known online and among victims groups for leading the search for her daughter ever since.
“She tried to raise awareness about the case through digital media; she more or less understood how public opinion works. Women searching for their loved ones instinctively understand what they need to do to make noise,” said Isabella Vargas, activist with the Olga Castillo collective – a feminist collective that accompanied Castillo, another mother who sought justice for her daughter, who was sexually abused by U.S. military personnel.
Feminist and women’s collectives in Bogotá that knew Moreno organized a gathering at the Pola monument on May 15 to commemorate her. Claribel was close to the feminist movement and attended its gatherings carrying her purple and pink sign demanding justice for her daughter: “Not all of us are here, Natalia is missing.”
“She was a woman who found refuge in the feminist movement. She reached out to us on several occasions, participated in our sit-ins and marches, and we embraced her in her struggle… It deeply pains us because this struggle has been about finding justice for all of us. It hurts us greatly that another mother is gone and that the State left her unprotected. We hold the State responsible,” Vargas said.
With an altar, candles, flowers, a bonfire, and a speech about conscientious objection to sexual exploitation, the tribute demanded justice for both Moreno and her daughter.
Abelardo de la Espriella supporters drive down Avenida La Esmeralda in Bogota on May 17, 2026. Image credit: John Boscawen.
Hundreds of cars briefly blocked all three lanes of Avenida La Esmeralda in the center of Bogotá on Sunday afternoon as supporters of hard-right Abelardo de la Espriella gathered to show their support for his candidacy two weeks before the presidential elections kick off.
De la Espriella himself was campaigning in Valledupar, but his campaign called for Abelardistas in over 70 municipalities around the country to come out and show their support by convening a noisy caravan.
While many Colombian families relaxed in neighboring Parque Simón Bolívar, a few hundred die-hard supporters of the far-right populist showman answered the call.
The hallmark of de la Espriella’s campaign for the presidency is its promotion of sincere patriotic fervour, and this passion was very much on display.
Colombian flags and football jerseys, vallenato, vuvuzelas, balloons and the words “Firme por la Patria” (Steadfast for the Homeland) abounded.
While the lanes filled up, the self-titled Defensores de la Patria (Defenders of the Homeland) honked their horns, danced, took photos, chatted and saluted one another. Some applied camouflage paint to their faces to get in character.
Vendors were selling Colombia flags and mango biche while children danced to songs hailing El Tigre’s achievements and virtues.
Some Abelardistas donned fake military fatigues and camouflage face paint. Image credit: John Boscawen.
Speaking to The Bogotá Post, some of those present said they were attracted to de la Espriella as an aspirational figure who makes them feel proud to be Colombian. Others are attracted by his personal values.
For Adriana, waving her flag in the middle of the road, “it is very important that he is a family man, he works hard for his family, he takes his family with him everywhere, and they are very close.”
She believes young people turn to crime because they lack the pride and self-confidence to make something of themselves, describing Abelardo as the kind of role model who could “inspire young people to make a positive contribution to society.”
Others had come along to demonstrate their implacable opposition to a government led by Iván Cepeda, the left-wing candidate currently leading in the polls.
Aron, wearing a baseball cap emblazoned with de la Espriella’s face, is saluting passersby. He explained his view that, “Petro is a socialist, but Cepeda is a communist. Petro is progressive, but Cepeda wants to completely change the country. He doesn’t believe in private property.”
His friend, Doris, added that, “Cepeda will take us down the path of Venezuela.”
Time and again participants reported that they believe Abelardo will bring freedom to Colombia.
For some, that meant freedom of speech, which they feel has been curtailed under Petro.
For others, freedom meant freedom from crime and corruption, which Abelardo will end by “ruling with an iron fist.”
For yet others, freedom meant an end to economic regulations that they see as inhibiting economic competition.
Everyone who spoke to The Bogotá Post said Colombia needed “saving” from something – which varied from person to person – and that Abelardo was that “savior”.
One man even said, “If we don’t win, they will have stolen it from us.” Accounts affiliated to de la Espriella’s campaign have been disseminating fake polling that shows him winning 86% of the vote.
Nevertheless, his supporters are pragmatic enough to vote tactically. Every person I spoke to admitted they would vote for right-wing Paloma Valencia in the second round, if Abelardo does not get through, in order to keep Cepeda from power. After an hour of stationary honking, the convoy, led by an enormous dumpster truck, set off on its tour of the city, and the mango biche sellers drifted back into the park.
Less than three weeks before Colombians head to the polls in presidential elections, centrist candidate Claudia Lopez’s odds at victory are slim, to say the least.
Since winning the primary contest to lead the Consultation of Solutions (Consulta de las Soluciones) bloc in March, the silver-haired former mayor of Bogotá has been criss-crossing the country to win over moderate voters.
But the latest polls report the 56-year-old’s share of the vote as being in the low single digits.
Dressed in her signature gilet and sipping from a mug of coffee, the former Harvard University guest lecturer says in flawless English that she wants to do the interview in Spanish – “I need to get people to vote for me,” she jokes.
With little to lose, López speaks candidly about her time in office, her views on other politicians, and her experience on the campaign trail.
Watch the full interview here
Reflections on her mayorship
López, who steered Bogotá through the Covid-19 pandemic and a mass wave of anti-government protests, speaks proudly of her stint as mayor from 2020 to 2024.
The presidential hopeful rattles off a list of her achievements in office: her management of the Covid-19 pandemic, lifting 600,000 women out of poverty, and rolling out Bogotá’s public bicycle network.
López also speaks candidly about the problems during her mayorship, which spanned the administrations of presidents Iván Duque and Gustavo Petro.
“Interestingly, I ended up having an easier relationship with President Duque, a right-winger, than with my left-wing president, whom I voted for,” says López.
López, who publicly backed Petro’s candidacy, describes friction between the national government and the mayor’s office.
“President Petro is an effusive leader, but he is too effusive, very machista, and I, well, I don’t agree with that; if there’s one thing I can’t stand in my life, it’s the abuse of power.”
On the campaign trail
Today, the former senator finds herself trying to carve out a place in a noisy election cycle marked by political extremes and polarization.
Her coalition’s platform is based on three pillars: security and territorial governance; equality and social justice; and regional development without corruption.
López’s shift to the center has drawn some criticism, including from voters who note the former Green Alliance member’s u-turn on key environmental issues like fracking.
Last year, she declared: “If god gave us oil, coal, and gas, that is what we will use.”
“I maintain this stance,” insists López, adding she opposes the Petro administration’s pause on all oil and gas exploration. “Stopping gas exploration means halting Colombia’s energy transition – it’s a mistake.”
López argues the policy has damaged the economy and reduced funds for investment and development.
Instead, she backs a gradual transition: “I estimate that the transition in Colombia from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources will take us about 25 years, give or take.”
The candidate believes in preserving biodiversity, saying she would not authorize mineral exploration in the country’s forests or protected areas, marking a softer stance than some of her opponents.
Among her rivals, López is especially critical of right-wing criminal defense attorney Abelardo de la Espriella.
“He is the only candidate – let’s put it this way – whom I would absolutely never vote for. He is a defender of mobsters. He is a shadowy character,” says López.
De la Espriella notoriously represented figures linked to paramilitary death squads, the head of the worst pyramid scheme in Colombian history, and Alex Saab, considered the frontman for corruption schemes by former Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro.
López argues that he is an Uribista – a supporter of the politics of right-wing ex-president Álvaro Uribe – but is on a different “side of the coin” to Uribe’s chosen candidate, Paloma Valencia.
“Paloma is definitely a supporter of Uribe, but she’s never exactly been a defender of mobsters,” explains López.
The ex-mayor refused to rule out voting for Valencia or for leftist candidate Ivan Cepeda, the two frontrunners alongside de la Espriella.
But López, a lesbian woman, is staunchly critical of Valencia’s stance on LGBTQ+ rights. The candidate for Uribe’s Democratic Center (Centro Democrático) party opposes adoption by same-sex couples while her party has blocked bans on conversion therapy.
She is particularly critical of Juan Daniel Oviedo, a gay politician, for agreeing to be Valencia’s running mate in March.
“I regret that Juan Daniel Oviedo feels compelled to play along with that anti-rights agenda. In fact, I believe he is the only person who has been told to his face that he is not considered an equal human being, that he is not considered a citizen with the same rights, and that they do not trust him to raise a child,” says López.
Despite her objections to Valencia, López says she still will not rule out voting for her in the second round, citing the improbable possibility that Paloma faces de la Espriella in a run-off.
But the former mayor maintains she would not endorse Valencia and Oviedo in any eventuality: “I wouldn’t campaign for them, ask anyone to vote for them, or endorse them.”
Looking to the future
Finally, faced with nearly impossible odds in May’s elections, López projects a springy optimism about her political future.
“I’m very happy with the campaign I’ve run, and I’m very grateful to the Colombian people,” says the candidate, stressing that it is just her first stab at the presidency.
“Ours is a new grassroots movement; we only just collected the signatures last year, so I feel grateful, happy, and very excited, and I’m going to continue in politics and continue working to build Colombian social democracy.”
Delcy Rodríguez and Gustavo Petro pictured at a meeting in Caracas in April. Image credit: Colombia President’s Office.
The Venezuelan government on Wednesday published a declaration saying it regretted recent violence in the Catatumbo region of Colombia just days after Bogotá announced bombing in cooperation with Caracas.
The statement muddies the waters about whether or not Venezuela was involved in the military operations against the National Liberation Army (ELN) rebels near the two countries’ joint border, which allegedly killed 7 guerrilla fighters.
“The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela expresses its profound concern and regrets the escalation of violence in the border region of Catatumbo,” read a statement shared on X by Foreign Minister Yvan Gil.
The declaration came after Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on Monday that he had ordered the bombing in cooperation with Venezuela.
“I gave the order to bomb the ELN camp in accordance with the agreement reached with the Bolivarian government of Venezuela,” wrote Petro on X.
Petro appeared to allude to an agreement with Caracas to cooperate on tackling cross-border crime following his visit to Venezuela in April.
But Caracas appeared to wash its hands of the recent bombing operation; while it did not directly acknowledge the bombing or Petro’s statement, its declaration said that it “rejects any armed action that compromises the peace, stability, and security of border communities.”
It added that the only way to preserve peace and stability in the region is through “mechanisms of understanding and mutual respect, avoiding actions that can aggravate tensions or generate greater risks for border populations, who for decades have faced the consequences of a conflict out of their control.”
Since last year, Catatumbo has been the site of what has been described as “the most serious humanitarian crisis of recent times” in Colombia. In January 2025, a family of three, including a nine-month-old baby, was killed, marking the collapse of fragile peace pacts between the ELN and the Frente 33 – a dissident faction of the demobilized FARC rebels – and triggering a humanitarian crisis on a scale not seen in the country for over a decade.
The Red Cross said that 2025 was one of the most complicated years for humanitarian conditions in Colombia: more than 235,000 people were individually displaced, over 176,000 people have been unable to move freely because of armed conflict, and there has also been a sharp increase in cases of mass displacements.
Venezuela’s statement highlights the cross-border nature of the conflict, noting that the country “has historically suffered the consequences of Colombian internal conflict.” Colombian armed groups like the ELN and dissident FARC factions have traditionally had a significant presence in Venezuela and were known to have ties to the Nicolás Maduro regime.
But both the interim government under Delcy Rodríguez and Petro have been under pressure from the White House to confront guerrilla groups.
2025 was worst humanitarian crisis in over a decade, says report.
Delegates from the International Committee of the Red Cross in Colombia. Photo: ICRC
Colombia’s armed groups must stop targeting civilians, urged the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) this week in a report highlighting the country’s intensifying conflict.
In 2025 the impact of armed conflict on communities was the worst recorded in a decade, said the ICRC, with all indicators showing mistreatment of civilians on the rise.
Quoting statistics from Colombia’s victim support unit – the UARIV – the human rights organization reported more than 87,000 persons displaced in mass events by conflict or threats, and a further 235,000 forced to uproot their lives individually.
Also in 2025, at various times more almost 177,000 people were confined in their communities by aggression by armed groups, either by combat or closing of transport routes.
And in a shocking figure, 965 persons were killed or injured by explosives, often delivered by drones, an increase of 34% on the previous year (2024). Most victims were civilians.
“The scale of this human tragedy cannot be described by numbers alone but is reflected in the suffering of entire communities living in fear of fighting,” said the ICRCs Colombia chief Olivier Dubois, presenting the findings.
“Families are forced to leave everything behind in order to survive, the search for thousands of missing persons, and the shattered lives of boys and girls scarred by war,” he added.
New forms of warfare
The ICRC has a key role in promoting International Humanitarian Law (IHL) in armed conflicts – the so-called ‘rules of war’ – of which an important part is keeping civilians out of the crossfire. The Geneva-based organization, which has been present in Colombia for decades, said upholding these rules depended on decisions by the armed actors themselves.
This was an increasingly difficult task given the breakdown of formerly hierarchical armed groups into numerous factions. And with new forms of warfare.
“In 2025, our teams worked in a context marked by the intensification and transformation of armed conflict dynamics, including an increasing use of new technologies, such as the use of drones, with significant consequences on civilians’ daily lives,” said Dubois.
The increase of explosive hazards – booby traps, landmines and drone bombs – affected civilians as clashes intensified in departments such as Norte de Santander, Cauca, Antioquia and Valle.
In these areas a total of 75 civilians were affected by landmines, and more than 540 injured or killed by “controlled detonation devices and launched explosive devices”, a term that includes a range of improvised devices from roadside bombs to armed drones and clumsy pipe mortars firing cooking gas cylinders packed with explosives.
Intimidation and power
The rise in drone-dropped bombs had not only intensified in the conflict but “generated fear, uncertainty and serious harm among affected communities”.
The report also described scant regard for civilian spaces as explosives were found scattered in fields, roads and even schools, stated the report.
“The way in which hostilities are conducted, and weapons are used, has direct implications for civilians and civilian property”, it added.
The ICRC also warned of the horror of sexual violence within the conflict framework, though often hidden and unreported. From its own presence in zones dominated by armed groups, the ICRC was aware that rape and abuse survivors faced stigmatization and fear of reprisals.
This created barriers for victims seeking care and assistance and under-reporting of cases: “The available figures do not reflect the true scale of this phenomenon,” said the report.
Armed groups used sexual violence as a form of intimidation and a show of power, but in some cases also as a form of punishment in communities under their control.
The report also called on armed groups to stop recruiting minors: “No person under the age of 18 should be recruited, used or involved in hostilities under any circumstances,” it said.
The humanitarian crisis observed last year was not a sudden phenomenon, explained the ICRC, but rather the culmination of year-on deterioration since 2018.
Bad month for civilians
A public bus burnt by armed men on a highway on May 12th. Photo: X
The report follows a calamitous month for Colombia in terms of civilian victims. In late April, 21 bus passengers were killed in Cauca when the EMC armed group exploded a roadside bomb by a queue of stopped traffic.
And in early May a young journalist was tortured and murdered by suspected Frente 36 dissidents in a rural area close to Briceño, Antioquia.
The report’s findings chime with those from thinktanks and UN agencies that have rung alarm bells over growing conflict and abuses by armed groups.
In February, UNICEF warned of a spike in child recruitment with numbers rising 400 per cent over five years, with one minor forced into conflict on average every 20 hours.
The same month thinktank Fundacion Ideas para la Paz (FIP) published data showing that Colombia’s illegal armed groups had grown by 84 per cent during the three years of the Petro government’s Paz Total policy
Armed groups had cynically used rounds of negotiations to expand both in numbers and territory, FIP analyst Gerson Arias told The Bogotá Post.
“As such, the policy gave a gigantic strategic advantage to the armed groups to strengthen their fighting forces,” he said.
War without ideology
A common theme between conflict commentators was the lack of ideology among today’s armed groups, lowering any humanitarian impulses. This even though these groups at times mimicked the uniforms, logos and terminology of former rebel movements with social agendas such as the FARC-EP.
“Any ideological dimension of these groups has been replaced by the dynamics of illegal markets,” Gerson told The Bogotá Post last week. “The dimension now is military strength to sustain those markets.”
From the 1960s to the 1980s Colombia’s guerrilla movements were close to rural communities. That relationship was now predatory, said Gerson. “Communities in Cauca, for example, don’t feel represented or protected by these armed groups who attack them, confine them and recruit their children,” he explained.
The question now is: will the current crop of combatants heed the ICRC’s call this week to respect civilian communities?
ICRC’s Olivier Dubois said that while the context was challenging, international humanitarian law should be foremost in the minds of all fighters in the conflict.
In particular, he called on armed groups to protect children from war, and respect spaces such as schools. He also called for an end to forced disappearances, of which the ICRC recorded 308 new cases last year, on top of the 132,000 historical cases reported by the authorities over six decades of conflict.
“No one should go missing, and no family should have to endure the uncertainty of not knowing what happened or where their loved one is. Preventing the disappearance of persons is an obligation imposed by Interntional Humanitarian Law on all parties to armed conflicts,” he said.
“Upholding international humanitarian law is fundamental to limit suffering in armed conflicts. When these rules are not respected, suffering is exacerbated”.
A crowd at International Workers’ Day in Medellín, 2026. Image credit: Cristina Dorado Suaza.
Colombian Minister of Labor, Antonio Sanguino, said the government was “on the verge” of issuing a decree outlining a path to collective reparations for trade unions at a rally in Medellín on May 1.
The government had previously pledged to pay state reparations to the trade unions movement, which it has recognized as a victim of the Colombian armed conflict.
Colombia remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world for trade unionists, accounting for 63% of all anti-union murders worldwide between 1971 and 2023, according to the Ministry of Labor of Colombia, citing data from the International Labour Organization (ILO).
The ministry had previously announced that President Gustavo Petro would sign a decree on May 1 establishing “180 remedial measures for the labor movement.”
While the measure did not materialize on International Workers’ Day, Sanguino maintained it was imminent and hailed the symbolic importance of the historic plans, telling the crowd, “so that our dead are not forgotten, so that our disappeared are present in every action of the government.”
The measures are part of the integrated collective reparation plan (PIRC) created under the umbrella of the peace process by the Victims Unit. The PIRC was developed in collaboration with labor unions and victims—a historic milestone for the Colombian trade union movement which suffered 15,481 acts of violence between 1970 and 2021.
On May 1st, thousands of Colombian workers gathered in Parque de las Luces in Medellín for International Workers’ Day.
The march began at the Teatro Pablo Tobón Uribe at 9:00 AM while an event scheduled for 12:30 p.m. saw the president and members of his cabinet give speeches alongside social organizations and labor unions.
Speaking at the rally, Sanguino praised the city and the province’s workers: “Antioquia is a people that resists—a resilient people that has fought for its rights and for workers’ rights since the time of María Cano… Today is not Labor Day—work is an activity. It is Workers’ Day.”
Gustavo Petro speaks at International Workers’ Day in Medellín, 2026. Image credit: Cristina Dorado Suaza.
Meanwhile, the crowd chanted “Antioquia is not (ex-President Álvaro) Uribe.” Banners and signs praised Gustavo Petro and his administration. There were also slogans and imagery referencing figures such as Betsabé Espinal – the Antioquian woman who led the first women’s strike in Colombia – and Che Guevara.
“I went out to march for workers’ rights because today, as every year, each and every worker in this country is recognized,” said Gladys Maya, a teacher.
The Colombian government outlined its progress on labor rights and the measures included in the labor reform: increasing the “living” minimum wage, reducing working hours, improving pay for night shifts and Sunday work, and raising benefits for older adults.
“This is not a favor; it is justice,” said Claribed Palacios, president of the Unión de Trabajadoras Afrocolombianas del Servicio Doméstico – an Afro-Colombian domestic workers’ union – regarding progress in labor rights for workers in the sector under the new government, such as mandatory formal employment contracts.
The rally also addressed the status of the pension reform, with Gustavo Petro urging the Constitutional Court of Colombia to fully approve it.
“Dignity is the foundation of the human person, and it is achieved when a person can feel that their rights are beginning to be realized and respected. Dignity is what we bring today,” said Petro.
The president also spoke about the upcoming elections, saying that his government will guarantee democracy through a “free and dignified vote,” but that he “hopes” the next administration will continue the change and social reforms.
“Let them not return us to horror; let them not return us to La Escombrera,” said Petro, referring to a mass grave uncovered in Medellín’s Comuna 13 district.
As the civilian death toll rises to 21, here’s a closer look at conflict in southwest Colombia.
Police anti-explosives experts remove half a tonne of explosives from a drainage channel in Cauca last week. The find follows a deadly attack by dissidents that killed 21 travelers. Photo: Policia Nacional
Colombian armed group the Estado Mayor Central (EMC) has admitted its role in the massive roadside bomb near the small town of Cajibío that killed 21 civilians and injured 60 others in Cauca on April 25, the worst such attack in the country’s recent history.
In a message, the EMC said “we cannot hide or justify the error” which resulted from buried explosives aimed at military targets but which they detonated in a queue of vehicles held at a roadblock.
Cajibío was one of 37 coordinated attacks over five days in Cauca and the neighboring Valle department, conflict analyst Gerson Arias of Fundacion Ideas para la Paz (FIP) told The Bogotá Post.
“This was a message of terror from the EMC who wanted to show their military superiority in the region,” he maintained.
And despite admitting its error, the EMC showed no signs of slowing its offensive in recent days. On Thursday police experts defused 600 kilos of explosives found wedged in a drainage tunnel near Piendamó, Cauca, potentially avoiding a fresh tragedy.
Civilian targets
Military sources told news media after the Cajibío bomb that the EMC fighters had likely set a trap on the Via Panamericana, the main route linking Cali and Popayán. They buried the massive bomb then forced trucks to block the highway before retreating to the wooded hillsides as a long queue of traffic formed on the busy road.
When troops arrived in their heavily armored tanquetas – fortified troop carriers with turret guns – they sensed a trap and parked several hundred meters from the blocked road, then moved on foot through the wooded hillside to engage the guerrillas.
An EMC fighter then remotely detonated the roadside bomb striking 15 civilian vehicles, killing 21 people and injuring 60. The combatants escaped in the aftermath.
Arias believes that despite their original plan to kill military targets, the EMC fighters chose to blow up civilian vehicles: “They decided to detonate; it was a decision by the EMC.”
Vehicles damaged by the roadside bomb at El Tunel, Cajibío, Cauca last April 25. Photo: X.
The resulting carnage was one of the highest civilian death tolls from a single incident in Colombian history, last seen on this scale in 2002 when a gas cylinder packed with high explosives detonated in a church in Bojayá, Chocó, killing 79 local people.
The deadly nature of homemade bombs, or ‘IEDs’ as they are called in military parlance (Improvised Explosive Devices), was shown again in August last year when 13 policemen were killed in Antioquia by a buried cylinder bomb that destroyed a helicopter.
Armed groups growing
Who was behind the Cajibío bomb? The EMC are remnants of the FARC’s 6th Front, formed by guerrillas that rejected the 2016 peace process, now called ‘disidencias’, or dissidents.
The EMC still uses the FARC name, uniforms and logo, and its leaders mimic the ideology of former FARC icons such as ‘Tirofijo’ insisting it is a “political insurgent force”.
Last week Colombia’s defense minister was swift to blame the EMC’s Frente Jaime Martínez which is under the command of alias Marlon, a former FARC commander freed from jail in 2016 as a signatory to the peace deal but who returned to the fray.
The Cauca-based Frente Jaime Martínez numbered around 600 combatants, one of the most powerful units in the Bloque Occidental of the EMC, explained Arias. FIP data showed the EMC numbering around 3,300 fighters spread across southern Colombia, an estimated growth of 23% during 2025. Around 60% of those were concentrated in southwest Colombia.
“Cauca is a strategic point for illicit mining and narcotrafficking, all the armed groups are seeking dominance, and this means intensive recruitment of young people into their ranks,” said Arias.
Cauca’s Andean massif, rugged highlands that provide shelter for armed groups. Photo: S. Hide.
The mountainous department is a heartland of Colombia’s illicit economies, straddling both the Andean cordillera and the Pacific lowlands with topography perfect for both hiding rebel armies and providing lush hillsides for coca crops and marijuana.
Cocaine production needs large cropping areas, 32,000 hectares of coca bushes covered the Cauca hillsides by the last count (Indepaz, 2024). And since Spanish colonial times the lowland riverbeds have provided a source of gold, today mined illegally with destructive heavy machinery paid for by cocaine profits.
Inland links
Cauca has no proper roads linking the highlands coast, though there are numerous clandestine ‘conflict tracks’, mule trails and navigable rivers to the Pacific. A labyrinth of mangrove swamps provides cover for boats running an estimated 70% of Colombia’s cocaine product to central America and beyond.
The department’s east is formed by the ‘Cauca Boot’, a foot-shaped chunk of mountainous terrain long held by rebel groups which penetrates as far as the Caquetá jungle linking the eastern Llanos plains and Amazon region to the Pacific coast.
This corridor created a vital link between the interior of the country and the EMC’s Bloque Oriental, in the eastern plains and jungles, Arias told The Bogotá Post.
Map of Cauca and neighboring departments, and recent conflict events.
Cauca was also bisected by the Via Panamericana, the highway running down the mountain and linking three main cities – Cali, Popayán, Pasto – and on to Ecuador to the south. This neuralgic route was easily blocked or attacked by armed groups, he said.
Combat units like the Frente Jaime Martínez would likely have autonomy from the top leadership of the EMC and could plan and execute their own actions, explained Arias.
“They articulate and communicate with the EMC structure, but are not necessarily subordinate,” he said.
Failed peace plan
EMC message. They still use the FARC logo.
The EMC was originally included in Petro’s sweeping Paz Total (Total Peace) initiative in 2022, but after repeated infractions by the armed group – including murdering four indigenous children the group had forcibly recruited – talks broke down in 2024.
In October that year Petro called off the talks and ordered the military to attack EMC heartlands in Cauca. The ensuing Operation Perseus sparked intense combat around the town of El Plateado in the Micay Canyon, historically a hideout for the FARC and now an EMC stronghold.
FIP has been critical of Paz Total and in February this year published data showing that armed groups had used the façade of peace talks to expand both their ranks and territory.
According to Arias, Petro’s government failed to understand the strategic importance Cauca had to the armed groups, as well as underestimating the control the EMC had over local communities.
Many rural families were reliant on coca growing and gold mining in a region lacking state presence: “There’s been a historical process of armed groups coopting civilian and ethnic communities,” said Arias.
This was evident in the civilian uprisings – asonadas – against state forces leading to incidents such as the 57 soldiers forcibly detained by a community in El Tambo in June 2025.
But the armed groups also preyed on the host population, he said, particularly victimizing the indigenous communities which make up 20% of Cauca’s population. EMC commanders frequently forced indigenous youth to join their ranks, creating conflict with the Nasa and Misak people of the area.
Contacts ofThe Bogotá Post living in rural Cauca – who declined to be named – said that armed groups controlled communities with networks of spies and even used surveillance drones to monitor movements.
A person needing to travel in or out of the zone controlled by a particular armed group needed permission and had to carry ID cards issued by community councils under orders of the armed group.
Anyone rejecting these restrictions was threatened and displaced, and particularly social leaders who spoke out against the armed groups risked being assassinated: 12 in Cauca so far in 2026.
The Cauca cauldron
Strength in numbers was a contributing factor to EMC aggression in the region, said Arias. FIP data showed a steady increase in armed attacks against both civilian structures and military targets since 2016, peaking at 175 recorded incidents last year (see graph below).
Year on increase in coflict events, Cauca and Valle, 2010-2026. Source: FIP
Not all events involved state forces; the EMC was under pressure from rival groups such as the ELN, Segunda Marquetalia and EMBF dissidents. All want a share of Cauca’s illicit economies.
And while waging a conflict of asymmetric warfare, often resorting to terror tactics, the EMC was also demonstrating military dominance with armed drones that put the Colombian military on the back foot.
“Out of 500 attacks, 408 were using drones,” said Arias. “The conflict is changing direction, but state strategies are not adapting to respond to this new technology.”
But beyond a military response, the state needed to implement a strategy of well-planned and sustainable social interventions to stem the resurgence of the armed groups.
In Cauca, this was a huge challenge, said Arias. For now, groups like the EMC were sticking to illicit gold and narcotrafficking, even if it meant constant conflict to deter and weaken state forces.
“They are on the attack to show they are the bosses,” he said.
Medellín, Colombia – Medellín Mayor Federico Gutiérrez prompted outrage last week after “censoring” a new book on M-19 guerrilla history at a public library.
Gutiérrez cancelled a talk of the book on April 21, saying that it glorifies terrorism and has no place in a public library.
The cancellation has drawn widespread criticism, with many observers citing the hypocrisy of the move one month after UNESCO designated Medellín as its 2027 World Book Capital.
Shortly before an event for the book at a public library on April 21, Gutiérrez announced on X: “This event will be cancelled. In Medellin, there will never be room for the glorification of terrorism. The M-19 was not a ‘romantic tale’: it was a terrorist armed group that left victims, pain, and death in Colombia.”
Attendants at the packed auditorium were visibly opposed to the measure, according to newspaper El País. Although staff removed microphones and speakers and the police surrounded the building, spectators remained in their seats.
“Our city respects the memory of the victims; no to propaganda for those that wielded weapons. This event has an obviously political character, and no public entity can host it,” the mayor continued.
But the book’s author, sociology professor Jaime Rafael Nieto, insisted that the government should not be able to censor events like the one last week: “This is not a space for government officials, but for writers, artists and citizens,” he told Spanish newspaper El País via phone call.
The April 19th Movement (M-19) guerrilla was founded in the early 1970s and became a violent urban actor, perpetrating kidnappings and killings in cities as well as symbolic crimes including the theft of libertador Simon Bolívar’s sword from its resting place and the Palace of Justice siege which left over 100 dead.
Incumbent leftist Colombian President Gustavo Petro – who has routinely publicly clashed with rightist Gutiérrez – was an M-19 militant, operating under the nome de guerre “Aureliano”.
He joined in the criticism of Gutiérrez’s move, writing on X: “The M-19 after making peace, was a legal movement with legal status. What you’re doing is censorship. Those who censor books end up burning them, and then they end up burning humans at stakes. Don’t censor; let minds and thoughts be free.”
Medellín’s history of books: a reformed city
Colombia’s second-largest city has seen a 542% rise in bookstores over the past seven decades, and is home to over 110 bookstores and 25 libraries – many of which were transformed from former prisons and police facilities, as per UNESCO.
“Medellín has become an international reference for urban and cultural transformation, where books and libraries play a crucial role in bringing positive social change. [Its] designation as World Book Capital 2027 is a powerful message on how culture can build peace and social cohesion,” noted Khaled El-Enany, UNESCO director-general.
The city’s literary turn is thus inseparable from its broader reinvention. Having been named the world’s “murder capital” in 1991, when 16 people were murdered daily on average, it has spent decades recasting itself through culture and education.
In 2004, then-mayor Sergio Fajardo – now a presidential candidate for the upcoming May 31, 2026 election – deployed a plan to combat structural violent patterns, investing in the city’s poorest neighborhoods. Libraries, metrocables and cultural centers were planted in the hillside of comunas, once the most dangerous neighborhoods in the Americas.
Over a 15-year period, Medellin built 60 cultural facilities in areas with the highest poverty, historic violence and population densities, and by 2024, the city recorded 300 homicides per 100,000 people – the lowest since 1942.
The result is a city that has made literary culture central to its identity. Every September, the Fiesta del Libro y la Cultura (Celebration of Books and Culture) – backed by $9 billion Colombian pesos ($2.5 million USD) from the mayor’s office – draws hundreds of national and international guests to its botanical gardens, parks and cultural centers.
The city also hosts an annual edition of the Hay Festival, the prestigious Welsh literary gathering.
Banned in the city of books
Regardless of Mayor Gutiérrez’s disapproval, the event on April 21 continued, with organizers stressing they consulted with the attendees what they believed should be done.
“There were three options: cancelling the event, going someplace different, or reaffirming our condition of citizens which occupy the city’s public space,” they said. Meanwhile, Nieto confirmed that the launch had been scheduled a month prior, and that the decision to go ahead in spite of the mayor’s outrage was an “act of civil resistance.”
“[The book is about] interpreting how the M-19 emerged and what its characteristics were. It isn’t about justifying its actions, because then the investigation would take on a partisan bias, and that’s not the case,” the M-19: From War to Politics author added.
The M-19 has become a contentious subject in Colombian politics since the election of Petro in 2022 as the country’s first leftist president, although the group demobilized in 1990.
Petro joined the urban guerrilla at 17 years old, but not as a combatant. As per Colombian news outlet La silla vacía, he was arrested by armed forces in 1985, and spent 18 months in prison, where he directed the jail library.
One of Petro’s greatest feats as an M-19 militant, in fact, was promoting the peace process that saw the group’s turn to peace and legality from 1989 to 1990. Most recently, the head of state celebrated his birthday on the anniversary of the armed group’s founding.
Nieto believes that studying M-19 history is imperative to understanding Petro’s government, and his book’s thesis: the M-19 was the Colombian armed actor that best knew how to combine war with politics.
“Every act of war produced political effects. And that made it a political actor,” he told El País.
Medellín, Colombia – Medellín Mayor Federico Gutiérrez prompted outrage last week after “censoring” a new book on M-19 guerrilla history at a public library.
Gutiérrez cancelled a talk of the book on April 21, saying that it glorifies terrorism and has no place in a public library.
The cancellation has drawn widespread criticism, with many observers citing the hypocrisy of the move one month after UNESCO designated Medellín as its 2027 World Book Capital.
Shortly before an event for the book at a public library on April 21, Gutiérrez announced on X: “This event will be cancelled. In Medellin, there will never be room for the glorification of terrorism. The M-19 was not a ‘romantic tale’: it was a terrorist armed group that left victims, pain, and death in Colombia.”
Attendants at the packed auditorium were visibly opposed to the measure, according to newspaper El País. Although staff removed microphones and speakers and the police surrounded the building, spectators remained in their seats.
“Our city respects the memory of the victims; no to propaganda for those that wielded weapons. This event has an obviously political character, and no public entity can host it,” the mayor continued.
But the book’s author, sociology professor Jaime Rafael Nieto, insisted that the government should not be able to censor events like the one last week: “This is not a space for government officials, but for writers, artists and citizens,” he told Spanish newspaper El País via phone call.
The April 19th Movement (M-19) guerrilla was founded in the early 1970s and became a violent urban actor, perpetrating kidnappings and killings in cities as well as symbolic crimes including the theft of libertador Simon Bolívar’s sword from its resting place and the Palace of Justice siege which left over 100 dead.
Incumbent leftist Colombian President Gustavo Petro – who has routinely publicly clashed with rightist Gutiérrez – was an M-19 militant, operating under the nome de guerre “Aureliano”.
He joined in the criticism of Gutiérrez’s move, writing on X: “The M-19 after making peace, was a legal movement with legal status. What you’re doing is censorship. Those who censor books end up burning them, and then they end up burning humans at stakes. Don’t censor; let minds and thoughts be free.”
Medellín’s history of books: a reformed city
Colombia’s second-largest city has seen a 542% rise in bookstores over the past seven decades, and is home to over 110 bookstores and 25 libraries – many of which were transformed from former prisons and police facilities, as per UNESCO.
“Medellín has become an international reference for urban and cultural transformation, where books and libraries play a crucial role in bringing positive social change. [Its] designation as World Book Capital 2027 is a powerful message on how culture can build peace and social cohesion,” noted Khaled El-Enany, UNESCO director-general.
The city’s literary turn is thus inseparable from its broader reinvention. Having been named the world’s “murder capital” in 1991, when 16 people were murdered daily on average, it has spent decades recasting itself through culture and education.
In 2004, then-mayor Sergio Fajardo – now a presidential candidate for the upcoming May 31, 2026 election – deployed a plan to combat structural violent patterns, investing in the city’s poorest neighborhoods. Libraries, metrocables and cultural centers were planted in the hillside of comunas, once the most dangerous neighborhoods in the Americas.
Over a 15-year period, Medellin built 60 cultural facilities in areas with the highest poverty, historic violence and population densities, and by 2024, the city recorded 300 homicides per 100,000 people – the lowest since 1942.
The result is a city that has made literary culture central to its identity. Every September, the Fiesta del Libro y la Cultura (Celebration of Books and Culture) – backed by $9 billion Colombian pesos ($2.5 million USD) from the mayor’s office – draws hundreds of national and international guests to its botanical gardens, parks and cultural centers.
The city also hosts an annual edition of the Hay Festival, the prestigious Welsh literary gathering.
Banned in the city of books
Regardless of Mayor Gutiérrez’s disapproval, the event on April 21 continued, with organizers stressing they consulted with the attendees what they believed should be done.
“There were three options: cancelling the event, going someplace different, or reaffirming our condition of citizens which occupy the city’s public space,” they said. Meanwhile, Nieto confirmed that the launch had been scheduled a month prior, and that the decision to go ahead in spite of the mayor’s outrage was an “act of civil resistance.”
“[The book is about] interpreting how the M-19 emerged and what its characteristics were. It isn’t about justifying its actions, because then the investigation would take on a partisan bias, and that’s not the case,” the M-19: From War to Politics author added.
The M-19 has become a contentious subject in Colombian politics since the election of Petro in 2022 as the country’s first leftist president, although the group demobilized in 1990.
Petro joined the urban guerrilla at 17 years old, but not as a combatant. As per Colombian news outlet La silla vacía, he was arrested by armed forces in 1985, and spent 18 months in prison, where he directed the jail library.
One of Petro’s greatest feats as an M-19 militant, in fact, was promoting the peace process that saw the group’s turn to peace and legality from 1989 to 1990. Most recently, the head of state celebrated his birthday on the anniversary of the armed group’s founding.
Nieto believes that studying M-19 history is imperative to understanding Petro’s government, and his book’s thesis: the M-19 was the Colombian armed actor that best knew how to combine war with politics.
“Every act of war produced political effects. And that made it a political actor,” he told El País.
A JEP hearing about the “false positives”. Image credit: JEP
Colombia’s transitional justice mechanism, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), announced yesterday that it had revised the official number of “false positive” killings – deaths illegitimately presented as combat casualties – from 6,402 to 7,837.
The announcement came as part of the JEP’s Macro Case 03, which is investigating extrajudicial executions between 1990 and 2016.
The country’s Truth Commission had previously established 6,402 cases of “false positive” killings but the JEP’s latest figures suggest the scale of one of the country’s largest scandals was greater than previously thought.
The information was provided by Pedro Elías Díaz on April 24, Magistrate of the Legal Situations Definition Chamber, during a hearing related to a massacre of leaders and children in San José de Apartadó, Antioquia. Díaz first revealed that 1,932 people had been killed in the department between 1990 and 2016, before disclosing the new national figure.
“The report also highlighted statistics on homicides and forced disappearances allegedly attributed to the public force between 1990 and 2016 nationwide, classified as illegitimate killings presented as combat deaths, amounting to 7,837 victims—a figure that remains dynamic as cases progress,” said Díaz.
The magistrate affirmed that in addition to the forensic identification of victims, the latest figures were based on victims’ reports submitted to the JEP since 2018 and documents from the National Center for Historical Memory, the Office of the Inspector General, and the Office of the Attorney General.
JEP President Alejandro Ramelli Arteaga later confirmed the revised figures and said that the period during which the “false positives” occurred was extended, from 2002 to 2008, to 1990 to 2016.
Ramelli added that the number is likely to increase as investigations continue: “They have been holding territorial hearings with those most responsible, who are also confessing to cases of executions and disappearances that had never been investigated. It is most likely that this new figure will continue to increase in the future.”
The “false positives”, many of which occurred during the administration of ex-President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010) are highly politicized.
President Gustavo Petro responded to the news with thinly veiled criticism of Uribe, whose Democratic Center (CD) party won the second highest number of seats in recent congressional elections.
“There are 7,837 victims of the state due to the systematic execution of young people under the government of the so-called “Democratic Security” policy — in reality, a policy of total death… They do not want reelection for social justice; they want it for death,” wrote Petro on X.
Paloma Valencia, the CD’s presidential candidate, has pledged an iron-fisted approach to armed groups similar to that of her political mentor, Uribe, who continues to lead the party.
Increasing numbers of travelers being denied entry after interrogations at the border.
Immigration officers have powers to interrogate, detain and deny entry to travelers. Photo: Migración Colombia.
Five foreign tourists flying into Colombia were turned back at Medellín airport Tuesday last week after other passengers reported them for “conversing on the plane about their plans for sexual encounters”.
Although not clear who exactly denounced the travelers, or what other evidence was produced, immigration officers barred them entry after declaring their reasons to visit Colombia as “illegitimate”.
The case is part of a growing crackdown by immigration authorities against sex tourism in Colombia, which has been on the rise in recent years.
The five U.S. citizens were interviewed by immigration officials after arriving at José Maria Cordova airport on a United Airlines flight from Houston.
According to posts by Migración Colombia, the men were overheard during the inbound flight discussing hiring sex workers to “fulfil their fantasies”.
The cases highlighted a trend of increasing sex tourism but also stronger measures to prevent it, said immigration officials this week.
“We are focusing immigration control on detecting these types of offenders, fighting sexual exploitation, and protecting children not only in Antioquia but throughout the country,” said Gloria Arriero, director of Migración Colombia.
Data showed that 60 tourists were denied entry at airports in the first four months of 2026, compared to 110 in all of 2025.
Watching angels
The problem existed in tourist destinations like Cartagena and Bogotá, but was most evident in Medellín, the capital of Antioquia and Colombia’s second city, said Arriero, with 48 of the cases registered at the José María Córdova Airport. Of the persons barred this year 51 were U.S. citizens.
In the last week alone 15 foreign nationals, mostly U.S. nationals, were denied entry including the five passengers overheard on the plane. Many of the suspects were arriving on flights from Houston, Miami and New York, added Arriero.
The latest expulsions followed a campaign by Medellín’s mayor Fico Gutiérrez to stamp out a rise in human trafficking and sexual exploitation, particularly of children, linked to organized crime and visitors to the city.
Prostitution is legal in Colombia although immigration officers have autonomous powers to deny entry to travelers if they suspect them of sex tourism. Checks have gathered pace in recent years under the “Angel Watch” system that allows Colombian immigration to identify foreign travelers with criminal records or reports of sexual offences against minors before they enter the country.
Angel Watch, which has been running in Colombia since 2024, gives immigration officers real-time access to data from national sex offender registries and state websites in the U.S, including the Department of Homeland Security and National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).
The U.S.-based Angel Watch Center then alerts overseas authorities to its citizens with convictions for sexual crimes against minors. Specialized police task forces in Colombia also use international alerts from INTERPOL to intercept other nationalities.
Angel Watch alerts can catch potential offenders at points of entry or prevent undesirables from obtaining or extending visas, if they are long stayers. The system blocks around 50 travelers a year detected with a history of pedophilia or sexual aggression.
Inadmiitted: five tourists sent home after talking trash on their inbound flight. Photo: Migración
Cell phones searches
For other cases border authorities rely on old-fashioned detective work, such as the case of the five travelers hauled in for questioning after reports of their lewd talk on the plane.
In February, two men were netted after being spotted filming children during the inbound flight. On investigation, border officers found bans from multiple countries for sexual offences involving minors.
Others have been interrogated based on items detected in their luggage; in February, a Lithuanian was sent home after inspectors found a huge haul of sex toys. These were decreed “inconsistent with his declared purpose for visiting Colombia” according to a press release at the time.
Migración has also revealed cases where large numbers of condoms, lingerie, or exaggerated quantities of “potency drugs” triggered interrogations and cell-phone searches which then revealed plans for sex tourism.
Migration officers also accompanied police units in sweeps where foreigners were suspected to be involved in wrongdoing. Tactics included visiting hotels and hostels which had registered visitors with previous convictions, but also monitoring their social media profiles for incriminating material.
Disturbing the peace
Earlier in April, Migración deported in a blitz of publicity Medellín-based influencer ‘Chill Capo’ (real name Steve Newland) who was sent back to the U.S. after being detained at a party in the city’s Parque Lleras, a hotspot for sex workers.
“We found he repeatedly used his social media to invite and organize sex parties at various establishments where the main focus is on women, viewed as just another object to attract foreigners,” said director of the regional migration office Paola Salazar.
#Medellín | Ruso, con extenso historial de quejas por alteraciones al orden público, fue expulsado, por parte de la autoridad migratoria. El individuo abordó un vuelo con destino a Miami luego de que la entidad consolidara un contundente expediente basado en múltiples denuncias pic.twitter.com/wMcuQSz2zk
The 42-year-old content creator denied the accusation claiming his on-line videos of sleaze-fests were simply to encourage “a safe experience” for clients seeking the services he advertised on social media. But since Newland’s visa had expired, he was slung out anyway and banned from the country for five years.
In another recent case, a U.S-Russian citizen living in the El Poblado district was detained and deported after two years of loud music, partying, and a constant parade of bikini-clad women in and out of his flashy flat.
40-year-old George Wolfe held day-long parties on his rooftop flat and accumulated dozens of fines for disturbing the peace.
Wolfe, who claimed to be a lawyer, threatened to sue immigration authorities but they reminded him that the state “has the discretion to admit, not admit, or expel foreign citizens”.
The question circulating on social media after Wolfe’s deportation was if Colombia was now less welcoming to overseas visitors. But statistics suggest otherwise since more than nine million tourists visited last year. Instead, the message for Migración seems increasingly clear: sex tourists aren’t welcome.
A bus damaged by the huge explosion on Saturday 30kms north of Popayán. Photo: X
A bomb attack attributed to fighters from the EMC armed group killed 20 travelers trapped on the busy highway connecting Colombia’s southwestern cities on Saturday.
The tragic events in the El Tunel sector, close to the town of Cajibío, unfolded after the dissidents mounted a checkpoint on the main Via Panamericana south of Cali and 30 kilometers (20 miles) before Popayán.
The busy road runs through a mountainous region dominated by gangs run by the former guerrillas dedicated to a booming cocaine industry in hidden canyons beyond state control. At the illegal checkpoint the fighters forced truck drivers to block the road and abandon their vehicles, causing a long queue of traffic.
According to video posted online, soon after a midday the huge explosion rocked the valley mangling around 15 vehicles caught blockade including two minibuses with civilian passengers.
The governor of Cauca, Octavio Guzmán, confirmed the 20 dead civilians caught in the blast were 15 women and five men, all adults. A further 47 people were injured, of whom three were critical. Five children were recovering in hospital. Eleven of the affected persons came from the same village of Pedregosa, close to Cajibío, he added.
“What happened on April 25th constitutes the most brutal and ruthless attack against the civilian population in decades in the department of Cauca,” the governor later announced.
The bomb had displaced 200 cubic meters of soil, he said, creating a crater five meters deep in the Panamericana highway, the main route linking Cali to Popayan and on to Ecuador. Despite the damage, road crews were able to partially reopen the road six hours after the blast.
Saturday’s attack, one of the worst atrocities in recent years, comes against a background of rising conflict between state forces and dissident armed groups in the southwest of Colombia.
A nuestro medio de comunicación llega video #PRIMICIA del momento exacto donde explota el artefacto explosivo en el sector conocido como el TÚNEL CAJIBIO CAUCA entre popayan y piendamo @Noti90Minutos@DELAESPRIELLAE
Just in the last four days communities across three departments – Valle, Cauca and Nariño – reported a series of what appear to be coordinated attacks against civilian and military targets. These included:
24 April – A bus bomb exploded close to base of the Pichincha Battalion in the south of Cali, causing damage and three injuries.
24 April – In the nearby town of Palmira, Valle, an army base came under attack from cylinder bombs launched from a passing vehicle, no injuries were reported.
25 April – Two attackers launched grenades at a petrol station in Rozo, Valle, damaging vehicles.
25 April – A police station in the rural community of Potrerito, close to Jamundí, came under gunfire attack in the early hours of the morning.
25 April – In another morning attack, Aeronáutica Civil reported drones launching explosives against a hilltop air traffic station close to El Tambo (Cauca), damaging antennas and leaving the radar inoperative.
25 April – a chiva rural bus was hit by explosive charges while traveling on Route 25 near to Mercaderes, south of Popayan. Police reported several injured including a child but no deaths
26 April – four men were gunned down in a bar in Toro, Valle, between Cali and Pereira.
According to a tally by thinktank Indepaz, the Toro deaths were the 48th massacre recorded in 2026. In Colombia a ‘massacre’ is defined by the intentional killing of three or more people at the same time.
This weekend’s attacks were typical of a return to terrorist tactics such as car bombs, motorbike bombs, drones dropping home-made explosives and other artisanal artefacts.
Cauca governor Octavio Guzmán visiting the scent of the explosion this weekend. Photo: Social Media
Saturday’s Cajibío attack was initially reported as a boobytrap bomb, or “IED” (Improvised Explosive Device) which are caches of high explosives buried by the roadside by rebel groups, usually aimed at passing military patrols
But later reports suggested the civilian vehicles were struck by a pipeta mortar. These are fashioned from household gas bottles and clumsily launched from mortars made of industrial piping.
Notoriously inaccurate, a pipetas have claimed many civilian lives in the Colombian conflict, most notably in the Chocó town of Bojayá in 2002 when a charge launched by FARC guerrillas struck a church killing 79 civilians sheltering inside.
Behind Saturday’s atrocity was alias ‘Marlon’ of the Estado Mayor Central (EMC), said Colombia’s defence minister of defence Pedro Sanchez. The state offered a reward of US$140,000 for information leading to his capture.
Original dissidents
Most Wanted…
Marlon, whose real name is Iván Idrobo, was formerly in the ranks of the FARC guerrillas where he trained as a bomb maker. He is now thought to lead the EMC’s Frente Jaime Martínez which according to the Defensoria del Pueblo controls the cocaine trade, illegal gold mining and extortion rackets around the town of Suárez in the northwest of Cauca.
The EMC, lead by former FARC chief Iván Mordico, has proven to be the most intransigent of the myriad of armed groups which the current Petro government has tried to broker peace with under his controversial Paz Total policy.
Seen as the “original” dissidents that rejected the partly successful peace process under former president Manual Santos in 2016, the EMC initially agreed to negotiate when Gustavo Petro came to power in 2022 but soon engaged in bitter infighting with rival armed groups creating a rupture with Paz Total.
For his part, Petro tweeted his disgust at the Cajibío attack and the EMC “narco-terrorists” behind it.
“The groups led by Iván Mordisco in Cauca are criminals who have committed crimes against humanity and must be treated as such,” he said.
Some pundits commented that Petro’s early treatment of the EMC as a political actor had given the armed group room to expand, contributing to the current security crisis. In the heat of next month’s elections, others turned their ire on presidential candidate Iván Cepeda, seen as an architect of Petro’s struggling peace plans.
Rival right-wing candidate Paloma Valencia accused Cepeda of his role in “tying the hands of state forces, the rampant increase in illicit crops, the historic numbers of massacres, and waves of violence like today’s”.
Valencia also rounded on Petro for posting photos of his birthday celebrations even as the country was reeling from the horrific footage of the Cauca bombing. “Show some respect,” she messaged.
Crucial Santa Marta conference will include voices of communities long opposed to the exploitation of fossil fuels.
Indigenous campaigners against oil drilling in the Amazon. Photo: courtesy Amazon Watch.
Thirty years ago, Colombia’s U’wa people were ready to commit mass suicide by jumping off a 500-meter cliff. The close-knit indigenous community would rather die with dignity than succumb to oil exploration on their ancestral land.
The U’wa announced their dilemma in 1995 in an open letter that ricocheted around the world. It was no empty threat: 400 years before their ancestors had jumped from the Alto de los Infieles (Cliff of the Infidels) rather than submit to the Spanish colonial yoke.
“The U’wa were the first to call oil the ‘blood of the earth’,” explains Kevin Koenig, director of climate and energy at Amazon Watch, a U.S.-based non-profit. “The U’wa were the first to say that oil needs to stay in the ground. They warned against its extraction and its impact on the world.”
Amazon Watch has supported the U’wa to resist extractive industries over the same three decades, along with dozens of other at-risk communities in Latin America.
This week, in a ground-breaking conference in Santa Marta, some of those efforts will come full circle at the first global summit on “Transitioning away from Fossil Fuels”.
The six-day conference, starting April 24, will host 50 country delegations plus dozens of civil society organizations.
This “road map towards renewable energy” is backed by the Fossil Fuel Treaty Initiative, an alliance of nation states, technical bodies, communities and individuals working to secure a “global just transition from coal, oil and gas”.
For the organizers the timing is critical with climate upset, fuel shortages, war in the Middle East and big oil’s sticky grip on geopolitics more exposed than ever. There’s never been a better moment to move to renewable energy.
A key part of the conference will be representation from indigenous communities; the U’wa, along with many others, will have a voice at the table.
Glacier gone
For Koenig, it is also significant that the inaugural meeting is in Colombia, one of the world’s most biodiverse countries, but also an oil producer moving to curb fossil fuels and embrace renewables.
There is further symmetry in the location: the small coastal city of Santa Marta is “just over the hill” from the U’wa territory which straddles the tropical glaciers of the El Cocuy mountain range, Koenig tells The Bogotá Post.
A hiking route over the same mountains is known as Colombia’s climate change trail – see the ice before it melts.
Prophetically, just three weeks before the conference’s kick-off, the IDEAM climate agency reported that a glacier in the heart of U’wa territory had melted for good.
“Satellite monitoring confirms that Los Cerros de la Plaza glacier coverage is today at zero square kilometers,” it announced matter-of-factly.
Living these realities gives indigenous communities such as the U’wa, wedded to nature and geography, a powerful voice in the transition from fossil fuels.
This experience has often come at a high cost, says Koenig. In countries like Colombia, particularly in the Amazon, oil companies are an existential threat to both the natural environment and the communities it supports. Drilling is invariably a catalyst for violence.
“Some countries use oil extraction as a reason to open areas, saying ‘we can militarize it and it will be safer’. In fact, oil and energy infrastructures are a magnet for armed groups, for political attacks or blackmail,” he explains.
Amazon Watch has supported many indigenous communities to resist oil companies in the Amazon regions of southern Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, often through practical means such as providing solar power and communications equipment, trainings and legal resources, but also by raising their voices to the outside world.
The organization’s latest report, The Amazon Under Siege, highlights how extractive industries and the armed groups that trail in their wake are putting Amazon communities in the crossfire.
U’wa sacred territory includes El Cocuy glaciers which are melting with global warming. Photo: S. Hide.
Oil addiction
Colombia might have turned a corner with its oil moratorium in Amazon regions but neighboring countries are on a different path, one that might be summed up by U.S. president Donald Trump’s call to “drill, baby, drill”.
“Ecuador is going in the opposite direction with new oil auctions, and two new exploration blocks in remote rainforest,” says Koenig. Peru is following suit in jungle areas hitherto untouched. Perhaps not surprisingly, neither of the Andean countries is attending the Santa Marta transition conference.
According to Koenig, Peru and Ecuador are already in the throes of social violence but now risk replicating Colombia’s conflict with its rural oil pipelines that are constantly attacked or bombed, or oil lines tapped by fuel thieves, creating spills in biodiverse hotspots.
Added to that, drilling new wells makes little economic sense, he says. Current markets are signalling peak oil demand by 2030 even while wind and solar are taking a bigger share of energy output.
By doubling down on oil extraction both countries are “gambling with their future.” Aside from the moral and ethical issues of drilling in remote rainforest with indigenous peoples, getting banks to fund these ventures against the headwinds of renewables is not guaranteed.
“This is the moment where we are seeing both wars linked to fossil fuels politics and dependencies, but also for the first time renewables energies are not just theoretical, they are real, and decision-makers know they are scalable,” notes Koenig.
Inga indigenous guards in Putumayo. The community resists oil extraction on its lands. Photo: S.Hide
Fresh air
This seismic shift is reflected in the sassy subtext of the Santa Marta conference: climate deniers not invited. Meetings are reserved for a “coalition of the willing”, Colombian environment minister Irene Vélez, a key organizer of the event, told the Guardian this week..
For campaigners like Kevin Koenig this attitude is a breath of fresh air. Previous climate change conferences, run by the UN, have failed to pin global warming on big oil, he says.
“We know that fossil fuels are the number one source of carbon emissions but that’s nowhere to be found in the Paris [climate change] agreement. That’s due largely to the influence of the oil industry and lobbyists,” says Koenig.
Changing the narrative requires an alignment between traditional knowledge and science, he says. Indigenous communities, the original resisters, are now part of that with their wealth of experience.
Bogotá, Colombia – Leftist presidential candidate Iván Cepeda challenged his opponents to a debate on Saturday after turning down previous proposals to face-off with his rivals.
“I challenge the far right, its two candidates – Senator Paloma Valencia and lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella – to a debate,” Cepeda told a crowd at a rally in Fusagasugá, a city near Bogotá.
His opponents responded by accepting the proposal, while also highlighting that they had been calling for a debate for months.
The possibility of a live face-off between candidates has been a recurring theme ahead of first-round presidential elections on May 31.
Shortly after beginning his candidacy last year, Cepeda dismissed the idea of participating in a debate: “I’m not going to take part in debates—let me make this clear from the outset—to exchange insults with other candidates, or to threaten one another, or to denigrate one another.”
Iván Cepeda addressed a crowd of supporters on Saturday in Fusagasugá.
Cepeda’s rivals have repeatedly criticized him for refusing to spar with them on the public stage, something they highlighted following the leftist candidate’s U-turn on Saturday.
“Allow me to correct you: you’re not issuing a challenge; you’re accepting the challenge you were invited to take up months ago,” said criminal defense attorney de la Espriella.
Valencia, the candidate for the Centro Democrático (Democratic Center) party, also seized the opportunity to pounce on Cepeda: “A few weeks ago, it was I who challenged Iván Cepeda several times to a face-to-face debate, yet you chose to hide away in the Senate with a controlled microphone.”
She suggested that Cepeda’s U-turn owes toaworsening performance in recent polls: “Now that the polls are tightening, you’re coming out of Fusagasugá with this challenge.”
Analysts agreed with Valencia’s suggestion, saying that Cepeda’s debate proposal is an attempt to inject life into a stagnating campaign.
“Cepeda has offered to debate because of his campaign’s inherent lack of momentum and general weakness. He is not captivating any new voters or finding a tangible way of changing the narrative in his favor,” Sergio Guzmán, Director at Colombia Risk Analysis, a political risk consultancy, told Latin America Reports.
Internal party polls reportedly show sluggish growth in Cepeda’s polling numbers since he became the official candidate for the Pacto Histórico (Historic Pact) in October.
Meanwhile, Valencia has been soaring in the polls following her victory in presidential primaries in March; Cepeda and de la Espriella did not partake.
But the debate is not without risk for Cepeda, according to Guzmán: “Cepeda runs the risk of having to go on the defensive of Petro and his administration.”
Others believe that Cepeda’s oratory style does not lend itself to the televised debate format.
“He has a much more academic tendency, which is not so typical in politics, let alone in modern politics,” noted Miguel Jaramillo Luján, a Colombian political strategist. In contrast, he noted that de la Espriella and Valencia have a more media-savvy communication style.
Nevertheless, the analyst told Latin America Reports that Cepeda’s debate style could give him the chance to woo crucial centrist voters: “I believe he can inspire confidence and credibility among his target audience and even among the centre, particularly when it comes to dispelling certain myths and lies that have been spread by the centre and the right.”
With the leading candidates agreeing to debate, the battle over the specifics – including moderators, questions, and location – begins.
The ELN, Colombia’s oldest rebel group, has been trying to source weapons from Syria. Photo: Youtube screenshot.
A plan to swap Colombian cocaine for guns was exposed last week when a Lebanese-Syrian smuggler Antoine Kassis – a cousin of deposed Syrian dictator Bashir al-Assad – faced trial for his attempt to send Russian-made armaments to ELN guerrillas.
The failed plot, which played out in a U.S. federal courtroom last week but seemed more suited to a Hollywood movie, risked putting military-grade weapons sourced from Syrian arsenals in the hands of the Colombian rebels.
In exchange, the ELN planned to send 500 kilos of cocaine disguised in a cargo container of Colombian fruit, according to U.S. Justice Department documents.
A federal jury convicted Antoine Kassis on charges of narco-terrorism conspiracy and conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization after a five day hearing. He now faces at least 20 years in a U.S. prison.
Kassis, 59, who had links to proscribed organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah, offered the ELN drones, grenades, assault rifles, missiles, mortars and heavy machine guns in exchange for the cocaine smuggled to a Syrian port.
He eventually hoped to sell the Colombian-supplied narcotics throughout the Middle East.
Captured in Kenya
The deal was initially brokered in 2024 before the fall of al-Assad but unraveled after a sting operation mounted by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 2025.
As court documents revealed, Kassis traveled to Africa in February last year after reassuring the Colombian guerrillas that the cocaine swap was still on – even after the unexpected fall of his cousin’s brutal dictatorship in Syria at the end of 2024.
Kassis claimed he could bribe Syrian port staff US$10,000 per kilo of cocaine to import the illicit drug through Latakia, a well-known route for drugs in and out of the eastern Mediterranean.
Despite the fall of al-Assad, he could still access “all the toys”, he told the Colombians, referring to the military-grade weapons.
Unknown to Kassis, DEA investigators had already infiltrated the Colombian end of the deal and sent an undercover agent posing as an ELN weapons expert to the crucial meeting in Nairobi, Kenya.
Kassis was arrested with the help of Kenyan police and extradited weeks later to the U.S.
Meanwhile the suspected ELN counterparts, named by news website Infobae as Alirio Rafael Quintero and Wisam Kherfan Okde, were arrested in Colombia. They are currently detained in Bogotá’s La Picota prison pending extradition requests from the U.S.
Missed missiles
Evidence from the Kassis investigation pointed to a vast money-laundering operation based in Colombia that shifted million-dollar drug profits in cryptocurrencies across four continents. According to court documents, the plot roped in Palestine’s Hamas, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel.
Syrian-Lebanese smuggler Antoine Kassis. Photo: Kenya Police.
The Kassis case also showed that the ELN was attempting to upgrade its weapons arsenal even as the armed group was engaged in on-off peace negotiations with Colombia’s Petro government. Talks are currently on hold.
The Marxist rebel group, properly known as the Ejército de Liberación Nacional, has been fighting the Colombian state since 1964 and is currently said to have 3,600 armed combatants, many based in neighboring Venezuela where it controls drug routes and illegal mining camps.
The latest round of peace talks, under Petro’s controversial Paz Total initiative, has seen the ELN expand in both territory and numbers within Colombia, with an estimated growth of 9 per cent in the last two years. Attempts to obtain Russian-made weapons via Syria are likely linked to that expansion.
Of note was the missiles included in the thwarted Syrian cargo. Though exact details were not given in the court documents, these could refer the portable shoulder-fired anti-aircraft weapons, highly coveted by Colombia’s armed groups for their ability to down helicopters and small attack aircraft used by state forces against insurgent groups.
In recent months Colombian armed forces have returned to aerial bombing of suspected guerrilla camps, a controversial practice that risks killing or injuring civilians and children. Bombing campaigns against dissident FARC groups in Guaviare late last year left at least 15 minors dead, according to news reports from the time.
And on February 4 this year, an air attack ordered by President Petro on an ELN camp in the Catutumbo region left seven ELN fighters dead, with no reports of child victims.
The ELN have in the past experimented with home-made anti-aircraft missiles, such as found in a hidden cache in Cauca in 2018, and some of their combatants are thought to have been trained in the use of Russian-made Igla-S missiles, of which 5,000 are used by state forces in Venezuela.
Hezbollah’s Latin American hubs
The Kassis case highlighted links between Colombian armed groups and the Middle East that include designated terror groups such as Lebanon-based Hezbollah.
According to expert testimony at a U.S. senate caucus on narcotics in October last year, groups like Hezbollah received funds via drug trafficking and money laundering in Latin America, with hubs in Brazil, Paraguay, Venezuela and Colombia.
“Hezbollah capitalized on a combination of weak local governance, corruption, and the presence of sympathetic diaspora communities to create cells and recruit financial facilitators,” former treasury official Marshall Billingslea told the caucus in October last year.
Billingslea suggested that Hezbollah could source up to a third of its income from Latin America, and until recently had close links through its Iranian backers Venezuela, now in flux with the forced removal of former president Nicolás Maduro to the U.S. in January this year.
Hard pivot to Colombia
But while its Venezuelan ties were more often reported, the Lebanese Shi’ite group had also made inroads into Colombian crime circles with a long history of deals, such as cocaine shipments sent by the Oficina de Envigado cartel, and drugs-for-weapons swaps with the former FARC guerrillas, he said.
In 2016, U.S. prosecutors brought charges against a Hezbollah laundering ring based in Medellín, according to reports in the Miami Herald at the time. Funds were connected to jailed Mexican kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.
Billingslea explained that groups like Hezbollah also saw Colombia as a refuge for foreign operatives who obtained fake passports and ID cards. Recent turmoil in the Middle East could stimulate armed groups there to increase their interests in countries like Colombia, he said.
“Now, with their Lebanese infrastructure in shambles, and with robust financing from Iran again in doubt, I believe Hezbollah will make a hard pivot to Latin America and to the drug trade in particular.”
La Mesa gang rounded up in Bogotá last week. Members are accused of murders and drug trafficking. Photo: Secretary of Security
The dismantling of a major crime gang which operated in Bogotá caused controversy last week after it emerged its leader was declared a peace negotiator under President Petro’s controversial Paz Total, or Total Peace, plan.
National police rounded up 23 members of the La Mesa gang in simultaneous operations in Tolima, Cesar and Bogotá. According to police reports, the gang was involved in serious crimes across the capital since 2012, including drug trafficking and murders.
News of the arrests was tainted by the fact that under the Paz Total process – the Petro government’s wide-ranging negotiations with armed groups – gang leader Gustavo Adolfo Pérez Peña, alias El Montañero, had his arrest warrant suspended under his role as gestor de paz, or ‘peace facilitator’.
The kingpin’s release sparked a furious response from Bogotá mayor Carlos Galán, who accused Petro of undermining the city’s efforts to curb crime.
Hoy en Bogotá anunciamos que, gracias a la Dijín, a la Fiscalía y a la @PoliciaBogota, fueron capturados 23 miembros de la banda “El Mesa”, entre ellos 8 sicarios. Mientras tanto, el Gobierno Nacional nombra al cabecilla de esa banda como gestor de paz y le levantó la orden de… pic.twitter.com/qiSmSoHgh7
“While in Bogotá,…the prosecutor’s office and the police, with the support of the Bogotá mayor’s office, are working to capture and dismantle a criminal gang dedicated to serious crimes, the national government appoints the leader of that gang as a peace facilitator and lifts the arrest warrant for him,” he railed.
The gang was also suspected of being behind last year’s gruesome killings where pieces of the bodies of victims were wrapped in plastic bags and dumped on the city’s highways.
A free pass for career criminals like Pérez Peña makes fighting crime “incredibly difficult,” added Galán.
Dodging a warrant
Alias El Montañero during his capture in 2019.
Details of La Mesa’s criminal activities released by the prosecutor’s office this week showed the gang originated in Bello, Antioquia, but spread to Bogotá in 2012.
Court documents reported in local news outlet El Colombiano paint Pérez Peña as a hardened criminal; he has been imprisoned four times, including for armed robbery, homicide and illegal possession of firearms, but was freed before serving his full sentences.
His rap sheet includes attacks on armored trucks, notably a cash heist in Bogotá in 2003 where a policeman was shot dead.
Pérez Peña’s most recent jailing was in 2019 when he was sentenced to eight years for conspiracy to commit a crime and illegal possession of firearms. It was during this stint that he was freed as a peace facilitator.
And even while the La Mesa gang has been rounded up this week with members facing multiple charges and long prison sentences, its leader and founder continues at liberty.
Get out of jail free?
Inclusion of criminal gangs in the Paz Total process has proved one of the thorniest aspects of Petro’s flagship policies and a political hot potato in the run-up to next month’s presidential elections.
Since its inception in 2022, the government’s peace negotiators have tried to include some of Colombia’s most embedded crime dynasties under the acronym Estructuras Armadas Organizadas del Crimen de Alto Impacto (EAOCAI).
This Paz Urbana, or urban peace, initiative is based on the reality that in Colombia today lines are blurred between organized armed groups and engrained criminal structures. Much of its effort has focused on Antioquia’s Valle de Aburrá, around Medellín, where many crime gangs took root after the fragmentation of the 1980s cocaine cartels.
The president’s office recently declared the process a partial success, claiming that the nominated peace spokespersons – many feared capos with violent histories – were now in a dialogue process which could “prevent further violence and prevent the resurgence of these structures”.
Many critics have predicted that – similar to the Paz Total process with large guerrilla groups – criminal gangs will leverage the negotiations to their own interests to gain time and territory or a get-out-of-jail-free card.
This week Medellín’s mayor Fico Gutíerez welcomed a resolution by the attorney general’s office to overturn many of the 23 nominations of local crime bosses as peace facilitators.
“The resolution removes 16 criminals currently serving sentences for serious crimes from the program. Seven remain eligible for the benefit,” he posted on X.
He also echoed Galán’s complaint that hardened criminals were being included in the peace process. “It is unacceptable that the Petro government has asked the prosecutor’s office to lift the current arrest warrant for homicide.”
Peace as a right
Defenders of Petro’s agenda hit back reminding that Paz Urbana was part of a constitutional process protected by Colombian law.
“Peace is a right, not a political strategy,” said Isabel Zuleta, a senator and key player in the Paz Total process.
The senator, who represents the government at the negotiating table with representatives of criminal gangs, accused the media and politicians of misreporting the negotiations.
“For nearly three years, a serious path toward de-escalating urban violence in Medellín and the Aburrá Valley has been painstakingly forged. Today, that work is being exploited by right-wing sectors that prefer to sabotage urban peace rather than acknowledge progress that is not electorally advantageous to them,” she said.
Zuleta also pointed out suspension of arrest warrants for gang leaders seeking peace did not free them of responsibilities for crimes they committed, nor would it stop judicial investigations.
Meanwhile, a mix-up between Petro’s government and Attorney General’s Office emerged over Antioquia’s urban peace process: 16 of the 23 capos named as peace negotiators were already in prison, so suspending their “arrest warrants” was nonsensical as they were already detained in the high-security Itagüí Prison.
“We truly never imagined that a request would be made to suspend arrest warrants for people already serving sentences,” chief prosecutor Luz Adriana Camargo told Caracol Radio.
Senator Isabel Zuleta with crime bosses in Itagüí Prison. Photo: Paz Urbana
Prison party
For this judicial – rather than political – reason, Camargo revoked the suspension orders for the 16 capos already doing time.
“We are talking about dialogues inside a prison with convicted individuals,” she said.
The Attorney General’s office also corrected widespread fake news – amplified by right-wing presidential candidates Paloma Valencia and Abelardo de la Espriella – that the 16 jailed crime chiefs would be freed as part of the Paz Urbana negotiations.
In fact, there were no plans to release the IItagüí peace facilitators, clarified Camargo’s office.
But in a further twist this week the government froze the peace talks in the Itagüí Prison after revelations that the jailed capos mounted an unauthorized vallenato concert by popular singer Nelson Velásquez, reportedly costing 500 million pesos (US$140,000).
For many commentators, the partying in the prison brought back painful memories of drug baron Pablo Escobar’s luxury lifestyle while supposedly imprisoned by the state in the 1990s.
Meanwhile the chief prosecutor Camargo came under fire for her decision to suspend warrants for seven other gang leaders currently on the run – including that of Pérez Peña of La Mesa.
This week the exact whereabouts of Pérez Peña was unknown, as was his willingness to engage in any peace process. According to a report by TV station Teleantioquia, the La Mesa gang leader was based in Madrid, Spain, while “moving around Europe as a sophisticated tourist”.
For El Montañero, coming home to Colombia, even under the guise of a peace facilitator, could be less of a holiday.
International Women’s Day 2024 in Bogotá. Image credit: Juan Vargas via Wikimedia Commons
The more than 100 female Colombian journalists who signed the ‘No to the pact of silence’ – a petition calling for answers about former president Andrés Pastrana’s appearance in the Jeffrey Epstein files –have posed 10 questions to candidates in the upcoming presidential elections.
The questions, shared on X last Sunday, intend to make the candidates take a clear position before the public on key women’s issues, including the mentions of Pastrana in the Epstein files.
So far, only two candidates – Roy Barreras and Sondra Macollins – have responded publicly to the questions, which come amid what some have described as Colombia’s #MeToo movement.
“We asked 10 questions to those seeking the presidency,” wrote Ana Cristina Restrepo, one of the women leading the ‘No to the pact of silence’, in an X post on April 12.
The questions addressed the preservation of abortion rights, equal representation in positions of high power, protocols to address violence against women, and the commitment to the continuation, protection, and strengthening of related public policies in support of women’s rights.
Among the 102 women behind the questions are public figures like: María Elvira Samper, a writer, journalist and philosopher; Patricia Nieto, professor at the University of Antioquia and journalist; and Maria Teresa Ronderos, Director of the Ibero-American Center for Journalistic Investigation (CLIP).
The list also includes Jineth Bedoya Lima, a pioneer of #NoEsHoraDeCallar (it is not the time to be quiet) a campaign that denounces sexual violence and urges survivors to speak out against gender-based violence. Bedoya is herself a survivor of kidnapping, torture and sexual violence by paramilitaries in 2000, with her case going to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.
The first candidate to respond to the questions was center-left presidential hopeful Roy Barreras of the La Fuerza Party. “101 women signatories of #NoAlPactoDeSilencio, representing thousands of others, have put these 10 questions to the presidential candidates. Here, in this thread, are my answers,” he wrote on X on April 13.
Sondra Macollins, an independent candidate for the Digital Party, also answered in an X post on April 14.“I want to respond to what has been raised by #NoAlPactoDeSilencio because the truth is not negotiable,” she said.
“The time of the ‘untouchables’ and complicit silence is over. If there are names linked to Andrés Pastrana and Epstein, the country demands clear answers,” added Macollins.
The materials included a photo of Pastrana and Ghislaine Maxwell wearing Colombian Air Force uniforms, alleged compromising emails, and testimonies where Maxwell described the two as friends and claimed to have flown a Black Hawk in Colombia. There were also reports that Pastrana flew on a private jet with Epstein and disgraced agent Jean-Luc Brunel, accused of recruiting minors for the late financier.
Later, #MeTooColombia was brought into focus following allegations by female journalists of sexual harassment in media outlets such as RTVC and Caracol.
According to the official ballot issued by Colombia’s National Civil Registry, there are 14 presidential candidates for the first round, which will take place on May 31. Four of them are women.
Colombian police test illegal drugs. Credit: Colombian National Police
The Colombian National Police published a report this week summarizing the results of its counter-narcotics operations during the first quarter of 2026.
Authorities highlighted the results of their new anti-drug dubbed ‘Esmeralda Plus‘, which has led to the seizure of 124 tons of cocaine and 99 tons of cannabis.
The report comes as President Gustavo Petro faces pressure from the White House to prove his commitment to countering the illicit drug trade, which has been a source of dispute between the two administrations.
“We are delivering significant strikes against drug trafficking. Today we fulfill our duty to Colombia and the world with dignity,” said Brigadier General William Castaño Ramos, Director of the Anti-Narcotics Division, following the report’s publication.
In addition to the 124 tons of cocaine and 99 tons of cannabis confiscated, the police also seized over 450,000 gallons of liquid chemicals and 396,000 kilograms of solid ingredients used in drug production.
They also announced the destruction of 981 narcotics laboratories and the recovery of 99 ampoules of fentanyl.
The confiscation figures mark a significant increase in seizures compared to the first 100 days of 2025, which saw 104 tons of cocaine and 63 tons of cannabis confiscated.
These figures serve as a response to the heavy tensions that preceded the White House meeting, when U.S. President Donald Trump personally attacked Petro, signaling him as a “man who likes to make cocaine” and claiming that Colombia was “very sick” under his leadership.
The report comes amid mounting pressure by Washington for the Petro administration to tackle drug production.
Trump has accused Colombia of failing to cooperate in the fight against the narcotics trade and carried out a series of unilateral aerial strikes against suspected ‘narco-vessels’ off the coast of Colombia since September, actions condemned by the Petro as a violation of national sovereignty.
Furthermore, Colombia’s President is currently facing two preliminary criminal investigations in Brooklyn and Manhattan regarding his 2022 electoral campaign. U.S. prosecutors are examining alleged illicit donations from drug trafficking networks and meetings with traffickers intended to block extraditions.
“The United States has found a mechanism to pressure the government and extract the maximum amount of concessions regarding the fight against drugs,” Sandra Borda, Professor of Political Science at the University of the Andes, told TheBogotá Post.
While the Colombian government appears to have stepped up its counter-narcotics operations amid U.S. pressure, some say this may not be enough to appease the White House.
“For Washington, these technical results are necessary, but they aren’t enough to fully restore trust,” Nelson Poveda, a political analyst and international affairs expert with experience in Colombia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told TheBogotá Post. “Still, these reports act as a bridge for ‘technical diplomacy,’ allowing cooperation to continue even when the political relationship is tense.”
In the report, authorities stress that ‘Esmeralda Plus’ attacks narcotics trafficking as a holistic system rather than just seizing drugs.
“We are directly destabilizing the finances, logistics, and operational capacity of these criminal structures,” pointed out General William Rincón, Chief of the National Police Service.
But Colombia has been excluded from key regional counter-narcotics efforts, notably the “Shield of the Americas”, a new anti-drug alliance promoted by Donald Trump.
The White House has historically favored eradication – the destruction of drug crops – as a counter-narcotics strategy.
But Petro has consistently defended his “Total Peace” policy, arguing that the war on drugs must move away from just persecuting farmers and shift toward dismantling the financial backbone of cartels and taking down criminal leaders.
However, authorities reported 40 arrests for extradition purposes and more than 17,000 arrests related to drug trafficking so far this year. Additionally, the manual eradication of around 2,000 hectares of illicit crops shows that the Colombian administration is maintaining a mixed offensive that combines social policy with high-impact law enforcement.
With the 2026 electoral cycle approaching in Colombia, Petro’s administration is under immense pressure to show that this humanitarian approach is not a sign of weakness before he leaves office.
Residency ‘R’ visas issued before 21 October 2022 need to be transferred to 5-year electronic format by October 31, 2026, Failure to comply could risk losing residency status.
Colombia’s cancilleria (foreign affairs ministry) was reminding foreign residents this week of the 2026 deadline to transfer their old resident visas to the new 5-year electronic visa scheme.
“Anyone with these visas, granted under previous regulations, must complete the mandatory process before October 31, 2026, before the Visa Authority,” announced the government, referring to resident ‘R’ visas issued before October, 2022, when new visa regulations came into effect.
Failure to transfer your visa by October 31 could lead to sanctions or even losing your residency status.
And even though the October deadline seems far away, the Cancilleria are expecting a flood of last-minute applications. Our advice is: don’t leave it to the last minute. Government websites are clunky at the best of times and you will need at least one appointment with Migración, which will be harder to get as the deadline approaches.
To avoid last-minute panic, here’s a quick Q and A to get ahead of the game…
I have a permanent ‘R’ residents visa in my passport. Surely that’s OK?
No. Under new laws passed in 2022 (law 5477 to be precise), all R visas for long-term residents are now subject to a transfer every five years, which also coincides with the lifespan of the Cedula Extranjeria (Colombian-issued ID card). So even if the visa stamp in your passport says indefinida, you still need to do the transfer.
The traspaso applies to:
All Resident (R) visas issued before October 21, 2022.
Any new R e-visas after five years (the expiry date is written on the visa).
If you change passports for any reason (expired, lost or stolen).
If you have a passport about to expire it makes sense to renew the passport before the visa transfer.
So, do I have to start the whole visa application process again?
No. The traspaso is relatively simple and can be done mostly online, directly with the Cancilleria website. Although touted as a ‘transfer’, in most cases you will be issued with a new visa number in an electronic format that will be sent to you by email. You can then print your own e-visa and carry it with your passport and store it in your phone.
Other steps require visiting your nearest Migración office.
What are the steps?
Obtain your Migration Movement Certificate from the nearest Migration Office.
Apply online for visa traspaso. Wait for the e-visa to be issued.
Register your new e-visa and apply for a new Cedula Extranjeria ID card online.
Make an appointment with Migration Office for your biometric data.
Collect your new Cedula Extranjeria ID card.
How much does it cost?
Around US$ 213 in total at current exchange rates. This breaks down to: US$25 for the Migration Movement Certificate, US$54 for the visa study, US$54 for the visa issuance, US$80 for a new replacement ID card (Cedula de Extranjeria).
What’s the Migration Movement Certificate?
Before applying for the traspaso, you need to obtain Certificado de Movimientos Migratorios, which is a printed certificate issued by Migración showing your entrances and exits from Colombia. The purpose of the certificate is to show your presence in Colombia. If you have been absent from the country for more than two years your residency status is automatically cancelled. You can apply and pay for the certificate online at the Migración website Formulario Único de Trámites page.
Be careful to select the centro facilitador (Migration office) that is closest to you because you must collect the printed certificate in person from the office. Also select the 10-year option for the certificate’s timeframe.
Not usually. One you have applied online, Migración will send you an email within three days notifying that your certificate is ready. You can go to the office and skip the lines by showing the email to the door staff. The counter staff will then print off the certificate. There is usually no need to make an appointment.
Can I get the certificate from overseas?
At present, Migración is only giving the option to collect the certificate in person in Colombia. This is one way to ensure that the visa holder is resident in Colombia. The option to collect in an overseas – i.e. at Colombian consulates – could change in the future.
Example of the printed Certificado de Movimientos Migratorios.
OK, so what about the visa transfer?
Now you need to the visa website at www.cancilleria.gov.co, and navigate to the visa page called the SITAC. Note there are English and Spanish pages (the Spanish version sometimes works better).
Fill in your details to enter the system, then select ‘Visa traspaso’ from the dropdown menus. You will also be asked to click on the timeframe when your original ‘R’ visa was issued. You will then be told what documents to present; these can be uploaded in PDF.
The visa application page on the Cancelleria website. Choose ‘traspaso’ from the options.
What documents are required?
This varies depending on your type of Resident visa and when it was issued, but generally:
Scan of your original R visa.
Scan of your passport main page.
Scan of your current Cedula Extranjeria.
Scan of your most recent migration entry stamp to Colombia.
Scan of your Migratory Movements Certificate issued by Migración.
Letter requesting the transfer, explaining the reason for the request (i.e. ‘para cumplir con Ley 5477 de 2022’).
Passport-style digital photo meeting the specifications.
Holders of permanent resident visas do not need to provide any more information. Other types of R visas might require evidence that the conditions under which the visa was granted still applies.
How do I pay?
The fees are divided into a US$54 ‘study’ fee, which is paid on submission of the documents. When the visa transfer is approved you pay an additional ‘visa issuance fee’ of US$54. Payment is also online by Colombian PSE bank transfer scheme, or you can use Visa or Mastercard credit cards.
Is that the traspaso done?
No. Once your e-visa is sent to you be email, you need to register your visa and apply for a new Cedula Extranjeria ID card within 15 days of receiving the new e-visa. The initial application and payment is done online, using the Formulario Único de Trámites page. Tick the Cedula Extranjeria box and select your nearest Migración office from the drop-down menu.
You’ll need to provide more information, scans, and an US$80 payment.
Back to the FUT page, but this time for the Cedula and visa registration.
Surely that’s the end of it?
Nope. Now you need to make an appointment with the same Migración office to provide biometric data for your new CE. To make an appointment, first register with the website here. Slots for the following week are allocated often at 5pm on Sunday, so try at this time.
If there are no slots available, take a screenshot of the appointment page as you can later use this as evidence to prove you were trying to comply with the 15-day plan (Migración sometimes sanction visa holders for not registering on time).
If you do not get an appointment within 15 days don’t worry; with your screenshots of the full agendas, Migracion are unlikely to complain. Everyone knows the system is overloaded.
What about my Cedula de Extranjeria?
Another delay: some people wait months for the plastic card, though lately the wait has been getting shorter. You can use your old CE or your passport in the meantime.
Should I hire a commercial visa company to do the paperwork?
The Cancilleria recommends applicants to apply directly for the traspaso directly via the website. However, commercial visa companies can assist with the paperwork but will charge a fee up to several hundred dollars. Try the process yourself before seeking professional help.
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en el sector conocido como el TÚNEL CAJIBIO CAUCA entre popayan y piendamo 
