Six guerrillas belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) died in a bombardment in the northwestern part of the country, and another, suspected of an attack with explosives in 2003, was arrested in the south, official sources announced on 17 April.

Six guerrillas belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) died in a bombardment in the northwestern part of the country, and another, suspected of an attack with explosives in 2003, was arrested in the south, official sources announced on 17 April.

Defense Minister Rodrigo Rivera specified at a press conference that “a well-aimed blow was successfully struck at a camp of the FARC’s Front 57, a sort of training school, in the department of Chocó (in northwestern Colombia).”

According to the report, in a joint operation with police ‘jungle’ special forces, Colombian Air Force (FAC) planes bombed the camp, located in a rural area of Riosucio (Chocó).

The operation left six rebels dead, including alias ‘Gloria,’ suspected of acting as an ideological officer for that faction of the insurgent group.

The police found a large number of weapons and propaganda materials in the camp. They also found a minor who was turned over to child protective services.

Elsewhere, in an operation carried out in a rural area of the town of San Vicente del Caguán, in the department of Caquetá (in southern Colombia), Aldemar Soto (alias ‘the engineer’), active in the FARC for twenty-five years, was arrested.

Soto is accused of activating a ‘house bomb’ on 14 February 2003, near the airport of the city of Neiva (in southwestern Colombia), in an attempted attack on then-president Alvaro Uribe (2002-2010).

According to the Army, the insurgent was sentenced in absentia to thirty years in prison for that attack.