Did Lozada and company get ahead of Iván Márquez in the confession of assassinations?

Recently, the senator of the FARC party Carlos Antonio Lozada confessed that it was he who ordered the execution of Álvaro Gómez Hurtado and, in turn, Pablo Catatumbo and Pastor Alape confessed that they were part of this and five other assassinations. His confession was due to the fact that Iván Márquez was carrying out a smear campaign against his former fellow militants, and to prevent Márquez from disclosing the serious events to the country, the ex-guerrillas went ahead in confessing responsibility for the crimes.

This theory was made known by an anonymous source revealed by the newspaper El Espectador. Along with the murder of Gómez Hurtado, the former FARC also confessed their participation in the murders of Pablo Guarín, Hernando Pizarro, General Fernando Landazábal, the former peace councilor Jesús Antonio Bejarano and the former guerrilla José Fedor Rey.

Why did the Gómez Hurtado case sound again

Former Senator Piedad Cordoba set off public opinion alarms last September, after she said on her Twitter account that there was an alleged meeting between former President Juan Manuel Santos, former Interior Minister Juan Fernando Cristo, Senator Iván Cepeda, the maximum head of the FARC, Rodrigo Londoño, or Timochenko, and Carlos Antonio Lozada.

Córdoba also said in his trill that at that meeting there would be important information about the 8,000 Process that would interest the former president of Colombia Ernesto Samper and the financing of his presidential campaign. Further, In statements to the media, she said that she has indispensable information on the murder of Gómez Hurtado that she would contribute to the Truth Commission.

After the trills of Córdoba, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), on Saturday October 3, arrived a letter signed by the three former guerrilla leaders announcing their intention to recognize the aforementioned homicides in advance.

“The responsibility (for the crime) belongs to the Antonio Nariño Urban Network (RUAN), of which I was a commander. (…) It is a decision that corresponds to the secretariat at that time. What I understand is that, seeing the scandal of the fight between sectors of power, the decision was made to keep it in reserve until the moment was considered ”. A half confession about one of the enigmas of contemporary Colombian history, which now requires evidence. The same ones that are needed to understand the framework of all the confessed crimes, “Lozada revealed to El Espectador about the Gómez case.

Criminal record

After the murder of ex-guerrilla Hernando Pizarro Leongómez in 1995, for which Gustavo Sastoque, a former CTI employee, was accused, there was the assassination of Álvaro Gómez Hurtado in November of that same year, 1995, in addition to the 8,000 Process scandal and the alleged irregularities During the presidential campaign of Ernesto Samper, the Colombian security forces were involved together with the Prosecutor’s Office in these events.

For this crime, there are ten officers and non-commissioned officers of the Dijín sentenced to 35 and 40 years in prison. All acted under the command of Captains Carlos Niño Flórez and Héctor Édison Castro, who currently have not explained why and how they murdered the militiamen of La Ruan. The only person who spoke was Chitiva Gonzáles, who told a judge of the republic the details of how his companions vilely murdered these young people, relates in an investigation published in the Semana Magazine.

At the time, it was said that the assassination of Gómez Hurtado had been the responsibility of the Norte del Valle cartel in collaboration with Police Colonel Danilo González. More than twenty years later, the FARC revealed that this assassination was under its control. Faced with such revelation, it will be necessary to analyze the file of this guerrilla on these and other criminal acts.

President Iván Duque reacted to the news: “We saw in the last hours that some members of the Farc have attributed this fact to themselves and that they are going to tell the JEP that. I want to say the following, obviously that justice fulfills its task, but also that it is not going to allow for one thing to try to obstruct the true responsibility behind that murder ”. The president said that he had doubts that the FARC would adjudicate the crime, “when there are already guarantees that no one will pay jail time. It does not stop generating doubts, suspicions, concerns ”.

In addition, he pointed out that if someone claims this death and it does not correspond to the truth, it should be understood “that a crime is being committed to obstruct justice in our country. We want justice to act forcefully and promptly and not to dismiss any of the considerations, or the claims that Álvaro Gómez’s family has also made about what they claim must be investigated so that the truth is known. “

What is clear is that although there was acceptance by the FARC in the assassinations, there are still many doubts about whether the fulfillment of said orders was the product of a chain of command, political ends, among other hypotheses that the justice, experts and public opinion will reveal over time.