Soldiers sold weapons to Farc dissidents: this is revealed by the prosecution’s investigation

The Office of the Attorney General of the Nation has opened an investigation into the alleged participation of members of the National Army in a corrupt network allegedly selling arms and ammunition to Farc dissidents in the south-west of the country.

Among those identified as captured are three soldiers, a sergeant and another retired, most of them assigned to the Army’s Third Brigade. The gang would have caught until 1,790 million pesos.

The first investigations in this process began in 2020. In January of the same year, they seized 5,000 ammo in a fishing boat that was sailing in the waters of Buenaventura, then they captured two women in the municipality of El Bordo, Cauca, who were moving with grenades belonging to the national army.

In this way, the General Inspectorate of the Army triggered the alarms, and in the analysis, 24 irregularities were found with the weapons and ammunition storage in Combat Support and Service Battalion No. 3 Policaropa Salavarrieta; they were sold to the column ‘Oliver Sinisterra’ Farc dissidents, a front led by pseudonyms ‘Ivan Marquez‘.

According to the prosecutor in charge of the case, this weapon was sold through a business that served as a front in the capital of Valle. This is a car wash and a school of private monitoring called VIP Security Ltd.

Indications from the control body indicated that the head of the criminal organization was Sub-Sergeant Eduardo Alexis Duarte, detained in Bogotá. At the hearing, the soldier pointed out that he was under pressure from two soldiers: Diego Salinas and Andrés Olarte. However, during an inspection in his office, they found 1,391 units of war material – which was not in the military inventory – units war material and false documents to justify the departure of arms.

According to the prosecution, before the arrests, the network sold 150,000 cartridges (of various calibers) and 2,000 pomegranates between 2019 and 2021. They obtained profits of 1,791 million pesos.

Finally, an American investigation was known a few days ago, in which it was detailed that, presumably, the weapons that had left the military canton of Pichincha, south of Cali, had been delivered to Farc dissidents to attack other illegal groups, the authorities and the civilian population.

The Office of the Attorney General of the Nation, in a coordinated effort with the National Police’s DIJIN, identified the route that would be followed by two alleged members of the so-called ELN Urban War Front, who allegedly surrendered to the border area with Venezuela to collect arms and ammunition for a structure of this illegal group.

According to the entity, the two men were intercepted and captured in Tabio, department of Cundinamarca, after trying to escape the organization organized against them. Upon inspection of the vehicle they were traveling in, two 9mm caliber pistols, eight magazines, 120 9mm rounds, three cell phones, $4,900 and 724,000 pesos in cash were found.

“Equipment and money were camouflaged between air conditioners and wrapped in vinyl paper. The evidence indicates that apparently they were going to be handed over to an ELN structure that is rearming in Tolima and in the center of the country,” the prosecution said.

In addition, it was learned that one of the pistols found belonged to and was stolen from the patrolman Jorge Alexander Riveros Patiño, assassinated in an attack by the ELN against a group of national police and national army who accompanied a commission that carried several electoral cards. . . The criminal action took place on October 26, 2015 in the rural area of ​​Güican de la Sierra, in the department of Boyacá, and 11 soldiers also died there.