:format(webp)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/grupoclarin/G3IDURP74ZG7HGWQSANEARRDBQ.jpg "Who is Salvatore Mancuso, the former paramilitary leader seeking freedom in Colombia?")
2024-03-23 05:22:02
BOGOTÁ (AP) — The recent deportation to Colombia of former paramilitary chief Salvatore Mancuso, who was one of the protagonists of the country’s armed conflict, shook the political and judicial scene, following President Gustavo Petro commissioned him to participate in peace talks and that he said he was willing to reveal links between paramilitary actions and state agents, businessmen and politicians.
After paying a sentence for drug trafficking in the United States, Mancuso was imprisoned in a prison in Bogotá, from where he seeks freedom. He still has outstanding accounts for thousands of crimes—most of them by line of command—when he commanded the extinct United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC).
The requests for freedom made by his defense and the government have generated a clash of powers between courts – some grant it and others deny it – which has kept his immediate future in suspense. And it depends on whether he can facilitate dialogues with armed organizations.
The Associated Press explains some information regarding his criminal history and his debts before justice.
Mancuso was born on August 17, 1964 in Montería, in the north, into a Colombian-Italian family. In that traditionally livestock region, he began his criminal career.
It was the time when Colombia had several active leftist guerrillas and groups of armed civilians had formed to fight them, claiming legitimate defense to protect their lands. By 1992, the rancher Mancuso was already offering information to the Army and was linked to counterinsurgency operations, according to the final report of the Truth Commission, an entity without judicial functions in charge of helping to clarify the long Colombian conflict.
Shortly following, Mancuso joined Carlos and Vicente Castaño, who in 1997 consolidated the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia. At the beginning they were small illegal groups that managed to have more than 30,000 armed men.
Mancuso commanded the North Blocks, Montes de María, Córdoba and Catatumbo. She was his representative in the peace talks with the government that led to his demobilization in 2004.
As a paramilitary commander, he accumulated thousands of crimes for which he has been answering since he laid down his arms, among which there are bloody massacres such as those in El Aro and La Granja in which dozens of people were killed, accusing them of supporting or belonging to guerrillas. He has three sentences once morest him that total dozens of years in prison, but thanks to the demobilization agreement, they were reduced to eight years.
He still has charges for 34,000 crimes that include 13,000 displacements, 12,000 homicides, 4,700 war crimes and 880 gender violence, carried out by commandos under his command.
In 2008, Mancuso was secretly extradited by the government of Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010) to the United States along with 13 paramilitary leaders wanted for drug trafficking.
He was sentenced to more than 15 years in prison for manufacturing and shipping more than 100,000 kilograms of cocaine when he was a paramilitary. Mancuso admitted that from the 1990s to 2004, he led paramilitaries who controlled large areas where cocaine was produced. The profits from drug trafficking were used to gather and arm more than 30,000 paramilitaries.
He also admitted that they transported cocaine in boats to the United States and collected taxes from other drug traffickers who transited their territories.
The former paramilitary finished paying his sentence in the United States in 2020, but remained there for four years waiting to resolve his immigration situation. His lawyers asked the courts to postpone his expulsion to Colombia, where Mancuso alleged that his life would be at risk. His other option was Italy, given his family ancestry. Neither option prospered.
Mancuso arrived in Colombia on February 27, following being deported. Due to open judicial proceedings, he was immediately detained in jail. However, he is trying to regain freedom because he alleges that he has already served enough years in prison in both the United States and Colombia, where he was imprisoned from 2006 to 2008.
In his case there is a conflict of jurisdiction between courts that has prevented him from obtaining freedom. The Special Jurisdiction for Peace, which has been trying members of the extinct guerrilla Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for seven years, and the Justice and Peace courts—since 2005 for the paramilitaries—are fighting over who should hear Mancuso’s pending cases.
In Justice and Peace, a judge agreed to grant her freedom for four years, but conditioned her to having no more pending charges. It was not made effective because he has 47 deprivation of liberty orders in two different courts: one of them agreed to suspend them and the other did not.
His defense appealed and the Supreme Court of Justice will decide.
But there are more drawbacks. The JEP declared that it has predominant and exclusive jurisdiction over Mancuso’s criminal conduct, which would leave Justice and Peace without decision-making power over his freedom. The matter will be resolved by the Constitutional Court.
Before the JEP, Mancuso might have access to sanctions that do not involve deprivation of liberty in exchange for contributing his truth regarding the conflict, while in Justice and Peace he might remain in jail.
Alejandro Alvarado, lawyer and coordinator of Governance and Democracy at the Peace and Reconciliation Foundation, told The Associated Press that the path is more severe for the paramilitaries: “While Justice and Peace managed to deprive the freedom of those most responsible for paramilitarism, before “The JEP and the FARC have only appeared before the magistrates and the victims.”
President Petro, who in his youth belonged to an extinct guerrilla group, designated Mancuso as a “peace manager”, a figure to collaborate in the government’s rapprochement with armed groups. Petro himself asked the authorities to suspend the arrest warrants as soon as he returned to Colombia.
It is unclear what negotiations Mancuso would participate in. However, Petro opened the door to dialogue with the Clan del Golfo, with a paramilitary heritage and the largest active drug trafficking cartel.
Mancuso has promised to reveal details of the armed conflict. In versions reserved before the JEP, he has named more than 300 people, among whom there are former state officials and former presidents such as Álvaro Uribe Vélez (2002-2010), whom Mancuso indicated he had known as governor of Antioquia (1995-1997) the massacre committed in El Aro. Uribe denied it.
In addition, it claims to have unpublished details. In a recent interview, he assured that Petro became a target and that they planned to make an attempt on his life, but he did not reveal who ordered it or when. He also indicated that they were asked to participate in a coup d’état in Venezuela and in the assassination of the deceased former Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. Plans that were never executed.
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