Clashes with FARC dissidents leave 14 police officers injured in Colombia

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – At least 14 policemen have been injured, including one in clashes between Jungle Commandos of the Anti-Narcotics Police and a group of 60 guerrillas of FARC dissidents in the Colombian department of Nariño bordering Ecuador.

The director of the Colombian police, General Jorge Luis Vargas, said that the clashes occurred in a rural area of the municipality of Tumaco, where a member of the dissidents known as the “Oliver Sinisterra” front was also killed.

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“In the midst of the fighting, a patrolman was seriously wounded and is currently being treated by police doctors, and 13 other police officers were injured or with firearms projectiles or grenade shrapnel and are out of danger,” said the high official.

After the fighting, war materiel such as rifles, explosives, bullets, and communication elements used by these dissidents, who are commanded, according to General Vargas, by alias “Allende”, were seized.

For information leading to the capture of this dissident leader, Colombian authorities are offering a reward of up to 90 million pesos (about US$23,500).

In Tumaco, there are some 30,000 hectares of illicit crops, most of them coca; FARC dissidents and other drug trafficking groups are fighting for control.

Last June, the Integrated Illicit Crop Monitoring System (SIMCI) of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported a 7% reduction in the area planted with coca in Colombia, from 154,000 hectares in 2019 to 143,000 ha in 2020.

The document stated that the departments with notable increases in the reported area between 2019 and 2020 are Córdoba (30%), Antioquia (27.5%), Bolívar (18%), and Chocó (18%).

In terms of reduction, the greatest impact is associated with departments with a historically significant concentration: Caquetá (-54%), Putumayo (-20%), and Nariño (-17%).