Two Colombian soldiers were kidnapped by rebels near the Colombian-Venezuelan border, the Colombian government announced on Friday.
"The information we have from intelligence sources is that they have been kidnapped,"
Defense Minister Diego Molano said in a statement.
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The two soldiers, a sergeant and a non-commissioned member, left their detachment on Tuesday to perform
“administrative tasks,”
the army said in a statement, without specifying whether they were in uniform or armed at the time of the incident. They were captured by members of the National Liberation Army (ELN) as they left their unit in the northeastern municipality of Tame, in the troubled Arauca region, on the border between the two. country, according to the Ministry of Defense.
This incident brings the number of Colombian soldiers kidnapped this year to four, including a colonel. At the end of last week, an officer was captured by dissidents of the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, signatory of the 2016 peace agreement), in the Cauca region, in the southwest of the country. A colonel has also been in the hands of these same fighters since April, after being kidnapped in the Arauca region. The army announced his murder in captivity, but his captors have since given evidence of life. For Minister Molano, the rebels are playing a
"macabre game"
on the border with Venezuela,
"kidnapping (people) on this side of the border, taking them to Venezuela to kill them or keep them there"
, he explained.
According to Diego Molano, there is
“evidence”
in Arauca of
a
“porous border with a regime that collaborates with drug trafficking and illegal armed groups”.
Despite the disarmament of the FARC, the country is experiencing a resurgence of violence in several regions, especially on the border with Venezuela. Peace agreement dissidents, paramilitary groups and the ELN clash for control of drug trafficking and illegal mining, taking advantage of the porous 2,200-kilometer border between the two countries . The Colombian government of Ivan Duque accuses the Venezuelan authorities of providing refuge and protecting Colombian rebel groups, accusations that Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro denies.