Paraguayan President promises to end the EPP guerrilla

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The president of Paraguay, Mario Abdo Benítez, promised on May 5 that his government would maintain its efforts to put an end to the “group of terrorists” of the Paraguayan People’s Army (EPP) guerrilla, which kidnapped 600 days ago the former vice-president Óscar Denis.

“Our commitment is to continue making the greatest efforts to end this group of terrorists who have already done so much damage to so many Paraguayan families”, said the President to journalists. The official made his statement after the family of Denis, kidnapped on September 9, 2020, by the EPP, denounced that they have been “600 days in oblivion”.

Abdo Benítez expressed his “solidarity” with Denis’ relatives in this context. “We do not question this family is going through pain,” added the president and indicated that his government is “in permanent” contact with the relatives through the Ministry of the Interior.

Denis, who was vice president of the cabinet of President Federico Franco (Liberal Party) between 2012 and 2013, was kidnapped by the EPP during his stay in the department of Concepción, of which he was governor.

On the occasion of the 600th day of captivity, Denis’ family criticized that the spokesman of the Joint Task Force (FTC) – a unit created in 2013 to combat that group – declared a “strategic defeat” of the EPP, which was born as a guerrilla group in March 2008.

Beatriz Denis, daughter of the political leader, assured a local radio station that they should “focus on working” and criticized that the group is labeled a “minority”. “Minority or not, they continue to operate as they want, when they want, and where they want,” she complained.

And in response to the words of Abdo Benítez, Beatriz Denis replied that “strength and solidarity are no longer enough”. She claimed that “here we want results, we want information, we want the kidnapped to return to their homes, we want at least to have information about them”.

In addition to the former vice president, the EPP holds in captivity the police officer Edelio Morínigo (since July 2014) and Félix Urbieta (since October 2016). Both events occurred in Concepción. The EPP kidnapped three workers on March 5, 2022, two of whom were found dead on April 2, and the other was released on March 14.