What is the truth about the Army operation in Putumayo where 11 civilians died

On March 28, the Army unveiled a military operation in which it discharged 11 people in the Alto Remanso village, in the municipality of Puerto Leguizamo in Putumayo. According to its version, the people would be members of the FARC Dissidences. However, as the days passed, different investigations and testimony have come to light that prove that this would be a case of extrajudicial executions, that is, that the State had committed a crime against humanity.

Colombians are dismayed by the facts, because among those executed by the military institution are civilians and community leaders, among them a minor, a pregnant woman, an indigenous governor and a president of the Community Action Board.

In the first investigations carried out by a Verification Mission, it was concluded that this intervention was an extrajudicial execution and that there is no basis for this crime. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Defense, Diego Molano, continues to defend what happened and assured that it sought to strike a strong blow to the armed structures of the so-called Second Marquetalia.

After the scandal caused by this event, Colombian media: El Espectador, Vorágine and Cambio magazine moved to the scene and collected evidence and testimonies where it is evident that the day the incident occurred the operation turned into a massacre against innocent civilians.

According to the testimonies, one of the most sentient deaths was that of the two-month-old pregnant woman, Ana María, had to bleed to death while trying to resist death, because despite the fact that Pájaro, one of her neighbors tried to help her, could not because of the long-lasting rain of gunfire. In addition, a few meters away where she was, her husband Divier, who was the president of the Commune Action Board, was also killed, his life was shot in the head.

“The fact is that the president of the Community Action Board was lying on his back, his face shattered, his arms open, his dark blue shirt covering his sturdy body and his jeans under his swamp boots, as can be seen in a photograph that rests on the case file,” he wrote in his article “The operative of the Army stained with civilian blood”, journalist José Guarnizo of the portal Vorágine.

Initially, 11 people fell on the scene and according to the Government's version, 4 were captured, but the media found that the procedures corresponding to this process were never carried out; and that the injured persons were taken to a hospital in the area. That is, to this day no one was ever prosecuting for their alleged links with the Dissidences of the extinct FARC, as President Iván Duque and the Minister of Defense wrote in their networks.

Another irregularity is that at the time of the operation, as more than 30 people tell the Colombian media, the military did not wear their uniforms but were dressed in black sweatshirts and t-shirts, in addition to this many of them were barbados and others wore hoods, according to those narrated by Cambio Magazine, survivors said that they also came shouting: “We are the guerrillas”.

On the other hand, as the crossing of fire took place in the middle of a bazaar where there were mostly civilians, since there were only five dissidents, lawyer Antonio Varón Mejía, an expert in IHL and professor at the Universidad del Rosario, explained to Vorágine that due to the size of the event, the Army had to ponder the principle of humanity over the military, more if they only went for two ringleaders. In contrast, General Juan Carlos Correa Consuegra, commander of the National Army's Air Assault Aviation Division, said they followed proper protocols and dwelt for civilians.

Finally, the villagers told journalist Jorge Restrepo of Cambio Magazine that “lawyer David Melo estimates that the military would have taken 200 million pesos from several people who were in the bazaar and the collection that was being done.”

After the days and the lifting of the bodies and investigations, the locals continue to take care of their lives and report that many of the evidence has been tampered with. Since the day of the massacre, the soldiers have been surrounding the municipality and the collection of evidence by the Prosecutor's Office and the testimonies are monitored by uniformed personnel, who are led by Brigadier General Oscar Alexander Tobar, head of the integral legal department of the Army, and Major General Paulina Leguizamón, deputy chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Military Forces and the third general who is in Alto Remanso is Juan Carlos Correa, commander of the Army's Aviation and Air Assault division.

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