The former director of the Colombian intelligence agency (DAS) claimed in front of the Supreme Court on Thursday that the former prosecutor general and minister of the interior and justice joined forces against him to help President Alvaro Uribe’s 2006 re-election.
Jorge Noguera, the ex-director of the DAS currently under investigation for alleged ties to paramilitary organizations, told the court that he believes Mario Iguaran, the prosecutor general during the Uribe administration, and ex-Minister of the Interior and Justice Sabas Pretelt de la Vega created the investigation against Noguera despite the lack of evidence against him.
“Sabas Pretelt nervously said to me, ‘Understand me, the issue of re-election is at stake, this [parapolitics scandal] causes a lot of damage to the country…’ Mario Iguaran said to me that he knew there was nothing there against me [to prosecute]”
The court is obligated to formerly investigate claims made under oath.
Noguera also made it clear he “never received any instruction from President Uribe to do something wrong.” He added, “Those who believe that by hitting Uribe they hit me, they are wrong… I have nothing to say against President Uribe.”
The former DAS director is being investigated for allowing members of the paramilitary organization AUC to inflitrate the intelligence agency. He is also accused of authorizing a hit list of union leaders and assumed left wing activists who all ended up being killed by paramilitaries.