Attorney General Investigates Irregularities in Military Forces Tender of More Than 7 Billion

The Attorney General's Office announced the opening of a disciplinary investigation against retired colonel Oscar Alberto Jaramillo, in his capacity as general director of the Military Forces Logistics Agency, and Juan Carlos Collazos, in his capacity as deputy director general of recruitment. According to the authority, alleged irregularities committed within a public tender that aimed to contract phase 1 of the completion of the functional rehabilitation project CRF Basan health battalion in Bogotá are investigated.

The uniformed, as members of the evaluation committee of this bidding process, details the Office of the Attorney General, would have violated the principle of objective selection that worked so that the entity would get the most favorable offer. Officials would have taken the decision in favor of interests other than those raised mainly. This tender, established in the evidentiary documents, exceeds 7 billion pesos.

In addition to this investigation, the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation took over the Army operation in Puerto Leguizamo, in Putumayo, in which 11 people died. The events took place on 28 March. According to the security forces and the State, the deceased were members of the FARC dissidents, however, the community claims that they were civilians. “By means of which the preferential disciplinary power is developed; I allow myself to request a full copy of the file of the case, advanced by the battalion against drug trafficking #3 ″, it is read in the document issued by the Office of the Attorney General.

“We asked the National Army for information, they sent the information and yesterday our human rights delegate requested the file from the Army, opened a disciplinary investigation for the purposes of studying it. We are waiting for the file to reach us to determine if, according to what was reported and with what the Army sent us, there are merits to exercise preferential power,” commented last week the Attorney General of the Nation, Margarita Cabello.

According to the Army, those killed belonged to structure 48 of the second Marquetalia. “This was an operation marked in human rights, in International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and a planned operation and was accompanied by a dominant intelligence, by naval intelligence and supported by military intelligence, which was directed against a criminal structure, the Gaor 48, which calls itself 'Commandos de “border”, said General Eduardo Zapateiro in an interview with RCN News Director José Manuel Acevedo.

According to the high command of the security forces, the place where the operation took place was a collection center where it was negotiating cocaine base paste and not a bazaar, as the citizens and journalists responsible for denouncing the situation have clarified, which has been classified as a new case of false positives.

“Is this called a bazaar? I do not authorize the operation unless it is backed by a dominant intelligence that allows us, with these troops, to discriminate in advance. This operation lasted 15 days of sustenance,” he added.

Regarding the pregnant woman and the minor killed in that operation, she said it was not the first time that this had happened. “I want to tell you that this is not the first operation where pregnant women fall, where minors who are combatants, Colombian combatants fall, and the criminal structure has members who are at the moment of the actions being taken against them,” Zapateiro said in his talk with that media outlet.

“They were in combat, they were on the death line (...) when the troops arrived, the reconnaissance and surveillance team at the security and surveillance point could observe that there is a coca farm meeting, bazaar, whatever you want to call it, but there they were negotiating coca because at dawn all the part of the coca they had already negotiated left and they stay in the bazaar drinking beer,” he added to his testimony.

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