Colombia’s President Ivan Duque said Thursday that some of the mercenaries implicated in the assassination of Haiti’s head of state knew about the plot.

In an interview with W Radio, Duque said that investigations indicate that all of the private security contractors who were either arrested or killed in Haiti took part in the operation to kill President Jovenel Moise.

The majority of the group that largely consisted of former soldiers were apparently not aware the objective was to assassinate Moise, said Duque.

It seems that within the group there were people who had received different instructions, but let’s also be absolutely frank, regardless of the level of knowledge that one had, what is evident is that there is a participation of the whole group in this assassination.

President Ivan Duque

Duque evades difficult questions

Among the former soldiers who were arrested in Haiti is the cousin of Duque’s National Security Adviser Rafael Guarin.

Colombia’s top national security chief curiously claimed he had never heard of his cousin.

W Radio failed to ask the president about an imagine that contradicted Colombia’s propaganda chief’s claim that Duque never met the Venezuelan businessman whose firm allegedly contracted the mercenaries.

The president also didn’t refer to the arrest of the former security chief of Haiti’s assassinated president who traveled to Colombia on at least five occasions this year.

Colombia’s president tied to suspect in Haiti president’s assassination

President contradicts mercenaries

The claims made by the president contradict those made by the sister of a former soldier who was killed in the hours after the assassination earlier this month.

According to Jenny Caroline Capador, her brother Duberney claimed that the person he was supposed to protect was dead before the former soldier arrived in a phone call allegedly made hours before Capador was killed.

The investigation into the assassination, which allegedly led to the arrest of 15 Colombians and the killing of three, has been confusing since the beginning.