Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has denied claims by former paramilitary leader Salvatore Manusco that the AUC coalition helped Uribe’s election campaign in 2002, reported Pais.
“Because of my democratic and Christian convictions, I have never cooperated with narco-traffickers, narco-guerrillas or narco-paramilitaries,” said President Uribe.
Uribe was responding to comments made by Salvatore Mancuso during a Supreme Court hearing. Mancuso said that several paramilitary leaders met in 2001 at the AUC conference and spoke about the need to support “a candidate with an ideology akin to that of the paramilitaries” on issues like security and combating rebels.
He claims that the paramilitaries chose Alvaro Uribe and that they made contacts within his party and donated funds to help his presidential campaign.
Mancuso is not the only person to have linked the current president with the paramilitaries. Freddy Rendon Herrera, alias “El Aleman,” Francisco Villalba, alias “Cristian Barreto,” and Miguel Angel Mejia, alias “El Mellizo,” have all made similar accusations.
Mancuso also claimed that the AUC were in contact with DAS official Joes Miguel Narvaez.
Mancuso was extradited to the US and stands accused of over 10,000 murders.