In his own camp located in the state of Zulia (Venezuela) Miguel Botache Santillanaalias Gentil Duarte, one of the main dissident leaders of the FARC, received an attack that would have cost him his life, sources on both sides of the border revealed to Time.
In December 2016, Gentil Duarte declared himself a dissident to return to the jungles in the east of the country. From Guaviare, the former guerrilla grouped the former Eastern Bloc and baptized it once morest Jorge Briceño, an organization that has around 1,200 men.
Since then, he has been in charge of moving the cocaine to Venezuela and Brazil through Guaviare, Vaupés and Guainía.
However, last November he would have arrived in Venezuelan lands trying to escape from the Colombian authorities, since a reward of up to 2,000 million pesos is offered for him, and in recent months he managed to escape several attacks, although he was seriously injured by a arm, losing mobility in the limb.
It was learned that the former guerrilla fighter sought the protection of Javier Alonso Veloza García, alias Jhon Mechas, designated head of the dissidence of the 33rd front, who located him, according to sources, in a camp in Venezuela around 14 kilometers from the border line with Colombia.
There, alias Gentil Duarte stayed with a minor named Salomé, who would be his sentimental partner, and was protected by regarding 40 members of the dissidents.
On May 4, that camp was infiltrated by unknown assailants at dawn, and the area where the cabin was located, where Gentil Duarte and Salomé were, exploded.
In the images shared exclusively by this newspaper, it is seen that the supports of the cabin, the bed and the mattress that were there were left on the floor, with the pillow destroyed and several items of clothing burned.
Several personal items were found on the Rimax table that was located next to the hut, such as a burnt field grill, a cream, the alias Salomé card holder, a soap and, particularly, the traditional cap that he wore all the time.
Apparently, the dissidents would have taken the body of the people killed in the explosion.
Regarding the perpetrators of the attack, it is hypothesized that they are related to the war that has broken out in Venezuela between Iván Márquez’s group, which calls itself Segunda Marquetalia, and the ELN for the control of illegal income such as drug trafficking and illegal mining.
This confrontation occurs on both sides of the border. While in Colombia the three groups are persecuted by the authorities, in Venezuelan territory some of them have the protection of the Nicolás Maduro regime.
On the other hand, the Colombian Defense Minister, Diego Molano Aponte, indicated that the former guerrilla would have died “due to a confrontation between themselves (the dissidents), between those drug-trafficking and terrorist groups.”
Gentil Duarte joined the guerrilla in 1981, at the 14th front. By 1999 he was already the head of the seventh and in 2014 he joined the General Staff, the year in which he also participated in the negotiating table in Havana (Cuba).
In December 2016, he created the Jorge Briceño front, an organization dedicated to extortion —of merchants and ranchers— and that for more than four years has carried out a recruitment campaign —in the vast majority of cases, forced— of minors. age in Meta, Guaviare and Caquetá.
Against Gentil Duarte there are four arrest warrants for homicide, rebellion, drug trafficking, conspiracy to commit a crime and displacement.
