BOGOTA: Colombian troops killed 11 dissidents of the disbanded FARC guerrilla group, officials said Monday, as a fight looms over the future of a 2016 peace agreement in runoff presidential elections.
The military operation took place Sunday in the south of the country as Colombians voted in the first round of presidential elections that left a hard-line conservative and a former leftist guerrilla vying for the presidency.
Defense Minister Luis Carlos Villegas said the operation in Montanita in the southern department of Caqueta left “11 dead and two wounded, including a minor who had been recruited by force.”
The 13 were part of an armed faction commanded by a former FARC rebel leader, Rodrigo Cadete, who rejected the 2016 peace agreement with the government of President Juan Manuel Santos.
The minister said the groups had been making threats against the mayor of the Caqueta capital of Florencia as well as an energy company in the region.
“The criminals had been demanding extortion payments from businesses” in Florencia and its surrounding area, the army said in a statement.
Under the peace accord, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) disarmed its 7,000 fighters in order to join the political process. It is now a political party.
However, remnants of the rebel force — estimated by the army to number about 1,200 — are still active in the southern border areas, financing their operations through drug trafficking and extortion rackets.
“We will not drop our guard against residual groups. We will continue fighting them with the utmost forcefulness,” Santos said on Twitter.
Sunday’s military action was a jarring reminder that embers of Colombia’s 50-year-old conflict are still burning despite the peace accord with the FARC, once Latin America’s largest guerrilla group.
Besides contending with remnants of the FARC, Santos’s government has yet to conclude a peace accord with the smaller National Liberation Army, or ELN.
Negotiations with the ELN resumed in Havana earlier this month, and its rebel forces observed a five-day cease-fire during the elections.
But the future of the peace accord has emerged as a key and divisive issue in the elections, which go to a runoff June 17.
The top vote-getter in Sunday’s round of balloting was conservative Ivan Duque, who has vowed to rewrite the accord with the FARC if elected.
Duque, who argues that FARC leaders got off too lightly, called for a “Colombia where peace coincides with justice” after the results were announced, reiterating his desire to revise — without “shredding” — the pact with FARC.
He faces off against Gustavo Petro, a former Bogota mayor who received 25 percent of the vote to Duque’s 39.7.
A past member of the now disbanded M-19 guerrilla group, Petro is the first leftist to contest a runoff in Colombia.
Promising “change” and to fight corruption and inequality, Petro gained momentum as the campaign progressed, outdistancing two other candidates — former Medellin mayor Sergio Fajardo and Santos’s peace negotiator, Humberto de la Calle.
“It’s obviously going to be very polarized in the second round,” said analyst Andres Macais.
![]()
11 FARC dissidents killed in Colombian military operation
11 FARC dissidents killed in Colombian military operation
- Defense Minister Luis Carlos Villegas said the operation in Montanita in the southern department of Caqueta left “11 dead and two wounded, including a minor who had been recruited by force.”
- The 13 were part of an armed faction commanded by a former FARC rebel leader, Rodrigo Cadete, who rejected the 2016 peace agreement with the government of President Juan Manuel Santos.
Pope Leo warns of ‘new arms race’ as US-Russia treaty to expire
- New START, the last nuclear treaty between Washington and Moscow, is due to expire on Thursday
- The treaty was signed in 2010 by then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his US counterpart Barack Obama
VATICAN CITY: Pope Leo XIV warned Wednesday of the risk of “a new arms race” as the last US-Russia nuclear treaty is set to expire.
New START, the last nuclear treaty between Washington and Moscow after decades of agreements dating to the Cold War, is due to expire on Thursday, and with it restrictions on the two top nuclear powers.
“I urge you not to abandon this instrument without seeking to ensure that it is followed up in a concrete and effective manner,” the American pope said at his weekly general audience.
“The current situation requires us to do everything possible to avert a new arms race, which further threatens peace between nations,” he said.
Leo, the Catholic Church’s first American pontiff, said it was “more urgent than ever to replace the logic of fear and mistrust with a shared ethic capable of guiding choices toward the common good.”
The Kremlin has offered a one-year extension of the treaty, but while US President Donald Trump said in September that an extension of the New START “sounds like a good idea,” little has changed since then.
The treaty, which included a monitoring mechanism, was signed in 2010 by then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his US counterpart Barack Obama.
But Russia suspended monitoring inspections during the Covid-19 pandemic and talks on extending the agreement have broken down in recent years due to tensions over the Ukraine war.
Moscow had also accused Washington of impeding monitoring missions on US soil.
In 2023, Russia froze its participation in New START, but it has continued to voluntarily adhere to the limits set in the treaty.
Moscow has last year tested its latest nuclear weapon carriers without atomic warheads, and Trump said he was moving two nuclear submarines closer to Russia.
New START, the last nuclear treaty between Washington and Moscow after decades of agreements dating to the Cold War, is due to expire on Thursday, and with it restrictions on the two top nuclear powers.
“I urge you not to abandon this instrument without seeking to ensure that it is followed up in a concrete and effective manner,” the American pope said at his weekly general audience.
“The current situation requires us to do everything possible to avert a new arms race, which further threatens peace between nations,” he said.
Leo, the Catholic Church’s first American pontiff, said it was “more urgent than ever to replace the logic of fear and mistrust with a shared ethic capable of guiding choices toward the common good.”
The Kremlin has offered a one-year extension of the treaty, but while US President Donald Trump said in September that an extension of the New START “sounds like a good idea,” little has changed since then.
The treaty, which included a monitoring mechanism, was signed in 2010 by then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his US counterpart Barack Obama.
But Russia suspended monitoring inspections during the Covid-19 pandemic and talks on extending the agreement have broken down in recent years due to tensions over the Ukraine war.
Moscow had also accused Washington of impeding monitoring missions on US soil.
In 2023, Russia froze its participation in New START, but it has continued to voluntarily adhere to the limits set in the treaty.
Moscow has last year tested its latest nuclear weapon carriers without atomic warheads, and Trump said he was moving two nuclear submarines closer to Russia.
Latest updates
Recommended
© 2026 SAUDI RESEARCH & PUBLISHING COMPANY, All Rights Reserved And subject to Terms of Use Agreement.