New bombing injures 14 in Colombia/Venezuela border region
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Twelve uniformed officers and two civilians were injured in a bomb attack on a police station in Cúcuta on the border with Venezuela, authorities said Monday.
“We reject the terrorist attack in Cúcuta, Santander, on the police station of Atalaya, which injured 12 uniformed officers and two civilians. Without a ceasefire, we are fighting the criminal groups that are trying to sow terror in this region,” President Iván Duque said on Twitter.
In the morning, “criminals had placed an explosive device” on a public bench in front of the police station, according to the region’s commander, Óscar Antonio Moreno.
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The blast caused “hearing damage” to the victims, a police spokesman told AFP but ruled out serious injuries.
Without naming those directly responsible, Defense Minister Diego Molano said on Twitter that he would not rest “until the ELN criminals and FARC dissidents who commit crimes in the department of Norte de Santander are eliminated.”
FARC rebels, who reneged on the historic peace deal signed in 2016, ELN fighters, the last recognized guerrilla group in Colombia, and other armed groups are fighting for drug trafficking revenues in the region, taking advantage of the porous 2,200-kilometer border between Colombia and Venezuela.
Shortly after Duque took office in August 2018, the two governments severed ties.
On June 25, the Conservative leader denounced a shooting incident involving the helicopter he was traveling in approaching an airport in Cúcuta. Neither Duque nor his companions were injured. According to Colombian authorities, the attack was planned from Venezuela by FARC dissidents, which Caracas denies.
On June 15, a car bomb was thrown at a military station and exploded in the same border region, injuring 44 people.
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