Colombia says “drug trafficking is taking over” Venezuela with Maduro’s blessing

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Colombia’s Minister of Defense, Diego Molano, on Saturday, April 3, accused the Venezuelan government of acting as an “accomplice” of Colombian drug trafficking groups in the heavy fighting that has pushed thousands of people to cross the border to seek refuge in Colombia.

“What is happening in Venezuela is that drug trafficking is slowly taking over that country (…) in collusion with the Bolivarian forces and the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro,” Molano said in an interview with Colombian daily El Tiempo.

In the last week, some 5,000 people have crossed the border into the Colombian municipality of Arauquita to seek refuge from heavy fighting between Venezuelan security forces and a Colombian armed group. Some report extrajudicial executions of civilians by Venezuelan soldiers.

According to Venezuelan authorities’ official balance, the fighting has left nine “terrorists” dead, 39 arrested, and four military personnel dead. Maduro acknowledged the possibility that dissidents from the FARC guerrillas, disbanded after a peace deal was signed in 2016, were involved in the clashes.

Read: More than 6,000 Venezuelans displaced to Colombia because of conflict

But, according to Molano, the Venezuelan military attacked “in a complicit and selective way only the dissidents” led by a former FARC fighter known as Iván Mordisco, seeking to favor another group led by the former leader of that guerrilla, Iván Márquez, who in August 2019 walked away from the historic peace agreement that ended more than half a century of armed conflict.

The head of the defense portfolio accused the Venezuelan government of allying with Marquez’s group and Colombia’s last recognized guerrilla group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), and of supporting “unity of command” drug trafficking routes along the 2,200-kilometer border between the two countries.

“The objective of the operations there is not the protection of the border. It is the protection of the drug trafficking business,” Molano said.

Colombia and Venezuela have not maintained diplomatic relations since Bogotá recognized opposition figure Juan Guaidó as interim president in January 2019.

Colombian President Ivan Duque accuses Maduro of protecting these armed groups in his territory. Caracas denies the accusations and blames Bogotá for the violence and for abandoning the border.

Source: La Nación