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to Commune 13 In May 2002, Medellín in Colombia had endured a first armed attack when – justifying protecting the presidential elections that Álvaro Uribe won – they began an urban war scenario called Operation Marshalwhich would later be repeated, with the paramilitary presence, in October of that same year, under the name of the Operation Orion. Mario Montoya, general of the army, called this neighborhood an independent republic, certainly an area of control of the People’s Armed Commands (CAP), and urban militias of the FARC-EP and the ELN, but also located in a strategic place in the city as well as on its exit to Urabá, coveted by drug trafficking and paramilitary armies.
Orion It was a counterinsurgency, drug trafficking and urban paramilitary operation directed by the national government and the mayor of that capital, based on work that the army and the police had developed in company with the United States government. All accompanied by two paramilitary armies: the Cacique Nutibara Block, led by Diego Murillo, alias Don Berna, and the Metro Block, under the control of Carlos García, alias Double Zero, which remember the Canis Major and Minor that accompany Orion in the sky. This alliance was confirmed by the Truth Commission, cited in the book you will not kill (p. 450), by Commissioner Marta Ruiz, in a story by a former soldier: “What was my mission? Going to Medellín, picking up the self-defense guides, was Don Berna, Double Zeroeveryone was gathered, they had not fought: ‘We are going to recover Commune 13’, I gathered the men in a jeep and a truck, I took them to the Fourth Brigade, I told them ‘My general, here are the informants who know everything, everything ‘, I left them there. […] They did know that Don Berna had sent them to him, and that Carlos had sent them to him and Double Zero”.
From this operation and the subsequent paramilitarization of Medellín there was a legacy that cannot be summarized as disproportionate use of violence
: a helicopter in the middle of the city shooting at a mountain is an image of total and dystopian war. The stories from families and neighbors about the disappearance of hundreds of people reminded the country that impunity was rampant. And one of the telltale hearts that did so most strongly was La Escombrera, a land where the paramilitary group settled, where they executed their victims and buried them under tons of construction waste. Much of this debris came out of the boom real estate on the mountain that faces San Javier, in the most privileged neighborhoods of Medellín.
In Orion’s shadowa novel by Pablo Montoya, he reconstructs the tragedy of relatives of the disappeared. Describe this tell-tale heart: I come from the fire and I go towards him. I am scorched earth. In my blood embers without respite. The quarrels resonate in me as if I were the extension of a redress never consummated. My name is Ofelia María Cifuentes and I am in La Escombrera. There is only compact darkness here. Dust, stones and garbage. Myself mixed with all of it
(p. 299).
In the interview given by Mario Montoya Uribe – general commander of the army between 2006 and 2008, and of the brigade that operated there in 2002 –, in the book military memories (2020), where he is asked about the Operation Orion declared: What happened? Once those two days of the operation have passed, we occupy the area. With support from the government and the mayor’s office, we rent houses. This has not been counted. We rented unoccupied houses, from people who had left and did not want to return because they were killed. In those rented houses I located a squad, a small barracks. One non-commissioned officer and nine soldiers in each house. I placed 20 points of those. The police began to build a police post in San Javier above. The buses didn’t go up there. We had to place two or three armed soldiers on the buses and they accompanied the people to the top. Those buses pass by the brigade
(p. 219).
Among Greek myths, Orion is a hunter. In another myth, Orion raped Merope and his father blinded him as punishment; He later becomes Artemis’s hunting companion when Apollo restores her sight. According to stories, he promised to annihilate every animal on the face of the earth, Gaea got angry and made a huge scorpion sting him and kill him.
In his interview, Mario Montoya stated: They have raised all the stories. La Escombrera, for example. It is a place that is said to have been where the ELN, the FARC and the paramilitaries killed and buried people. They have been digging for 10 years and have found absolutely nothing.
. In December 2024, after 36 thousand cubic meters of earth excavated thanks to the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, they found the remains of two people. In January, they found more. The families were right, Orion I tried to sweep everything away, but they became the scorpion. This is the most important news in years in Colombia and La Escombrera is the telltale heart that has former president Álvaro Uribe Vélez and those close to him facing the ultimate proof of his responsibility in the violation of human rights. They now want to distract attention from this fact by calling for military intervention in Venezuela, so that Trump can act and crush the findings into chaos.
Montoya continued in his novel: And that which I am now, burns without ceasing. But I want to turn off. Let there be no more noise. Not in me. Not in anyone. Not at all. I barely remember the outside
. May the earth be light for you and may goodness – and justice – germinate now.
* Doctor in sociology, researcher at the Center for Thought of the Colombian Amazon A la Orilla del Río. His latest book is Risen from the jungle
