Colombia’s Missing Persons Search Unit (UBPD) surrendered the remains of legendary “guerrilla priest” Camilo Torres to his family and friends on Sunday, exactly 60 years after his death.
A few dozen people were invited to the National University’s Cristo Maestro chapel for a two-part ceremony in which UBPD director Luz Janeth Forero formally surrendered the dark brown chest that contained the priest’s remained.
The remains were received by Jesuit priest Javier Giraldo, who in 2019 requested a search for the remains of Camilo Torres.
The priest’s body was disappeared on February 15, 1966, after his guerrilla unit carried out an attack on an army unit and was killed in El Carmen de Chucuri, a municipality in the Santander province.
The UBPD found Torres’ remains in an unmarked vault inside the military mausoleum of the Municipal Cemetery of Bucaramanga, the capital of Santander.
Guerrilla group ELN last month announced that authorities had identified the remains of their fallen comrade.
The Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed that it was investigating the identify of Torres’ alleged remains, but has yet to confirm that they belong to the rebel priest.
According to Giraldo, the Medical Examiner’s Office failed to timely identify the remains because of political reasons.
The Jesuit priest and Torres’ family members decided to lay the rebel priest to rest in the Cristo Maestro chapel to honor his dedication to public education.
The Torres family previous expressed concern that the ELN would use the burial site of their fallen relative for propaganda purposes.
Apart from being a legendary ELN member, Torres was the founder of Latin America’s first sociology department while working at the National University.
The rebel priest was also key in the creation of Liberation Theology, a Catholic movement that considered the teachings of Jesus Christ a mandate to fight oppression and poverty, mainly in Latin America.
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