Colombian President Uribe announced the dismissal of 25 Army officials,
because of their alleged involvement in the disappearance and murder of
eleven young men in Soacha. Five members of the Navy were accused of
being a “threat to the national security” of Colombia, the United
States, Great Britain and the Netherlands.
Uribe Wednesday admitted “there may be members of the armed forces involved in murder”, following the sacking of three generals, four colonels, seven lieutenant colonels, three commanders, a captain and six officers all in the north east of Colombia. The dismissal of three high army officials already was announced the day before already.
They are suspected of having abducted young people from the town of Soacha, just south of Bogotá, murdering them and registering them as guerrillas killed in combat.
Neither Uribe nor army commander Freddy Padilla explained how the 25 soldiers
cashiered on Wednesday might have been
involved in the deaths of the 11 men who disappeared early this year and whose bodies were found in August
and September in common graves in a turbulent area in Norte de Santander near the
Venezuelan border.
According to Colombia’s forensic institute, there are 45 more cases of people having disappeared and ended up in army mass graves. These cases were not included in the investigation that led to the dismissal of the 25 army officials
National security threat
The five marines that were accused of posing a “threat to the national security of Colombia, United States, Great Britain and the Netherlands,” allegedly were working for drug traffickers, RCN reported Tuesday.
The five are suspected of helping the drug traffickers in the Caribbean, passing on information about the location of foreign navy vessels. The former Navy chief already is in jail awaiting trial for the same crime.