President Juan Manuel Santos on Wednesday defended his record on security, saying Colombia’s homicide rate in 2012 was the lowest for 30 years.
In a speech in southern Colombia, Santos also said the last year saw 27% fewer abductions than the previous year, fewer car-jackings and the seizure of a record amount of cocaine – 207 tons in total.
The president failed to say how high the country’s homicide over 2012 was.
He also claimed that all the leaders of illegal armed groups in 2011 “are in prison or dead, and [the current leaders] now know they are going to fall, that’s an inescapable fact.”
In Cali to deliver 1000 extra police officers to Colombia’s third largest city, the president congratulated the army on recent victories against FARC guerrillas. “Our forces do not stay still for a single day, [they] ended the year with a powerful blow to the FARC: 14 members of the organisation killed and 15 guns recovered in an operation in Antioquia,” he said, according to local media.
Santos was attacking those who claim he is weak on security issues compared to his predecessor Alvaro Uribe. He did not name his detractors but Uribe himself is among his strongest critics.