With the Colombian military already reeling from increasingly likely allegations that one of their units had ambushed and killed an elite anti-drugs police squad on the orders of a drug gang, comes the news that 18 Colombian soldiers have been arrest on charges of killing innocent civilians on the pretext of them being leftist rebels.
Authorities said that 29 such innocent civilians, including young children and a pregnant woman, were killed in in the northern department of Antioquia in the last 18 months.
Defence Department Vice Minister Hernan Sanin met with local and military authorities, as well as some human rights groups, and then announced that all efforts would be made to ensure similar events wouldn’t happen again.
The Judicial Liberty Corporation, an organisation of lawyers, claims that soldiers have deliberately carried out these killings because of pressure to improve their record of killing guerillas. In a statement released in May they claimed that members of the 4th Brigade had been involved in the “extrajudicial execution of more than 100 people” in the region.
The military has held off commenting on the matter until the investigation is further advanced.
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