Death toll in north Colombia guerrilla violence rises to 80

A bloody onslaught by the National Liberation Army (ELN) on rivals and civilians in northeast Colombia has risen to 80 in just over three days, the governor of the affected Norte de Santander department has said.

"It is estimated that more than 80 people have lost their lives" in the ELN assault launched last Thursday in the Catatumbo region on civilians and dissidents of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) who kept fighting after it disarmed in 2017, governor William Villamizar reported on Sunday.

The last toll on Saturday was estimated at 60 people, including seven ex-FARC combatants, in five municipalities of the mountainous cocaine-producing region near the border with Venezuela.

Villamizar said about two dozen people had been injured and some 5,000 displaced in the fresh outbreak of violence, and described the resulting humanitarian situation as "alarming.

The army said more than 5,000 soldiers have been sent to the region to "reinforce security."

Call off negotiations

The FARC disarmed under a 2016 peace deal reached after more than half a century of war.

But the pact failed to extinguish the violence involving leftist guerrillas - including FARC holdouts - rightwing paramilitaries and drug cartels over resources and trafficking routes in some regions of the country.

The ELN has in recent days also clashed with the Gulf Clan, the largest drug cartel in the world's biggest cocaine producer, leaving at least nine dead in a different part of northern Colombia.

The latest violence prompted President Gustavo Petro on Friday to call off negotiations with the ELN in his pursuit of "total peace" for the country.

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Source: TRT