Colombian ex-Senator Piedad Cordoba fled the country Friday after police alerted her that extreme right-wing groups have been planning her assassination, her lawyer told reporters.
“What obligated [Cordoba] to leave the country yesterday was the alert that there was a plan, already in action, to assassinate her and [police] asked her to leave in order to escape danger, very much to her sorrow. Important sources from within Colombia, of which I can not reveal, announced the alert,” her lawyer Luis Guillermo Perez explained.
Perez also confirmed that they have recently seen an increase in personal attacks against the former senator, including attacks via social networking sites such as Twitter.
At the La Pola prison, Colombia’s Interior Minister German Vargas Lleras commented that he didn’t have “any knowledge about this information, I can’t confirm or deny it, all that I can say is that the custodial body assigned to ex-Senator Piedad Cordoba is very complete…the Ministry of the Interior has been preparing to offer her total security.”
The mystery surrounding Cordoba continues as she faces criminal investigations for being involved in political and social scandals.
It was decided Wednesday, in the investigation against Cordoba for her alleged ties to the left-wing guerrilla organization FARC, that ex-President Alvaro Uribe could not be considered as a victim in the case. Then, Thursday in the ex-president’s testimony for his alleged involvement in the wiretapping scandal, Uribe admitted asking DAS to investigate Cordoba following the death of one of the ex-senator’s escorts, which she had blamed on the government.
Cordoba’s lawyer confirmed that she will continue her attempt to negotiate for the end of the armed conflict, despite the backlash she has received, and that her exile will be only temporary.