This week began with the deployment of units to reinforce security in the city of Cali, which will host the COP16 biodiversity summit next week and is under threat of “possible reprisals” from the guerrilla due to military operations in the area, to guarantee order and security in rural areas.
According to the Government, dozens of armored vehicles and 11,000 police and military personnel were deployed in Cali to “guarantee successful development” of COP16, indicated Deputy Minister of Defense Daniela Gómez to the local press.
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Likewise, President Gustavo Petro assured that “the security of COP16 is guaranteed”, while highlighting that over the weekend the Army advanced with armored vehicles on a bastion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the largest dissident of the FARC, located about 130 km from Cali, in the department of Cauca.
In the midst of intense fighting that left at least twenty people injured, The guerrillas asked the international delegations not to attend the United Nations summit on biodiversity, to avoid putting their integrity at risk.
FARC dissidents
EFE
“With the recent Perseus operation in the Micay Canyon, the possibility of retaliation by organized armed groups is being evaluated,” the Government indicated, and recalled that to confront this situation, the presence of public forces in the area has been strengthened. where the event will take place.
After months of attacks against public forces, FARC dissidents operating in the southwest of the country had declared a truce to facilitate the holding of the summit, which will be attended by some 18,000 representatives from some 200 countries, according to the Police. But the military operation with armored vehicles in the Micay Canyon unleashed a new wave of violence, since the president authorized bombing the guerrillas, in response to a recent attack by rebels with explosives launched from drones that left 17 injured.
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The president “has been supervising the security arrangements for COP16 since Thursday,” General William Salamanca, director of the National Police, told the media in Cali. On the other hand, in the midst of attacks on public force posts in the department of Cauca, Salamanca defended Operation Perseus, which seeks to regain control of a large mountainous region where guerrillas settled who deviated from the peace pact that disarmed the FARC in 2017.
The Police Director also congratulated the Army for “arriving in this area where More than 10 years ago there was no presence of institutions, and even less of public forces” and where FARC dissidents control a coca cultivation and transportation corridor in the Micay Canyon.
COP16.
EL TIEMPO Archive
Finally, President Petro has insisted on resolving the armed conflict through peace talks, but Iván Mordisco, the main dissident commander in Cauca, was removed from the negotiating table in April for repeatedly failing to comply with the ceasefires agreed with the public force.
Thus, the Government announced that they will maintain strict surveillance of what happens in Cali and in general in the departments of Cauca and Valle del Cauca, to be attentive to any threat that may arise against the safety of the thousands. of experts, journalists and unions that will be part of the development of COP16 in this region.
