Juan Sebastian Aguilar, 58, was shot in the chest by a proficient sniper who reportedly spent days lying in wait in the mountains above his target’s upscale home in northern Bogotá. The marksman, according to media reports, escaped on horseback into the lush mountains behind the housing complex, ending in an almost cinematic killing. His exit also complicated police efforts to track his movements.

Aguilar’s death at first glance appeared to be a simple settling of scores — revenge for past betrayals — between rival gem traders. But the sophistication of the hit has since led observers to speculate that the killing could be connected to broader criminal groups like drug trafficking and money laundering syndicates. Others believe he may have been eliminated to ease the way for killing another emerald trader.

SEE ALSO:‘Selective and Silent’: The New ‘Green War’ for Colombia’s Emeralds

“This is a settling of scores, but not among the emerald traders, it’s among the drug traffickers,” Petrit Baquero, who authored “The New Green War” (La Nueva Guerra Verde), a book about ties between Colombia’s emerald barons and organized crime, told InSight Crime.

Aguilar had become a powerful individual with significant security around him, he added. “Whoever decided to target him had people trained in the exercise of violence and used war weapons – not just a hitman on a motorcycle. It was something entirely professionalized and undoubtedly an attack that must have been worth a lot of money,” said Baquero.

This is not the first time Aguilar had been targeted. He narrowly survived an attempt on his life last year, and, according to El Tiempo, investigators are exploring whether it could be the same killer. And while almost certainly linked to the emerald business, sources shrug off the idea of a new round of tit-for-tat killings — an extension of what has been called the Green War — and believe that more criminal elements are at play.

The Green War

Though Colombia’s emerald industry dates back over 500 years to the time of the Spanish Conquest, the modern-day business has a murky history. It is marred by violence and conflict, particularly during the Green Wars of the 1980s, during which up to 6,000 people were killed in clashes between rival mining clans and right-wing paramilitary groups fighting for control over the lucrative mining regions in Boyacá, about 150 kilometers from Bogotá.

The recently deceased Aguilar, also known as “Pedro Alguilar” or “Pedro Pechuga,” came from that era. He began his emerald career as bodyguard and then head of security for so-called “Emerald Czar” Victor Carranza, who, in the 1980s, successfully fought against notorious drug lords Pablo Escobar and Jose Rodriguez Gacha for control of the gem industry.

Prior to his death from cancer in April 2013, Carranza was the most powerful figure in Colombia’s emerald business.

The financial spoils are not just access to the $150 million in annual emerald exports, but ample opportunities for money laundering. The exchange of stones for cash often takes place on Bogotá’s streets, making them ripe for leaking dirty money into the system.

SEE ALSO:Colombia’s Great Survivor: Victor Carranza

Baquero reckons the score against Aguilar may date back to the post-Carranza days and the push for power from rival emerald barons whose business interests shifted into the drug trade and money laundering.

“These are the aftershocks,” he said. “Maybe Aguilar was not a drug trafficker, but there are links and power relations with people involved in that environment, and his assassination may be due to that.”

Stubborn Frontmen?

One theory is that former members of the so-called Junta Directiva, or Board of Directors, found that frontmen — among them possibly Aguilar — were unwilling to return properties and businesses held for them.

This shadowy organization once held significant influence in Colombia’s criminal underworld, according to sources and media reports. Allegedly headed by Julio Lozano Pirateque, The Board’s associates operated behind the scenes, controlling networks that straddled illicit operations and legitimate businesses, such as foreign exchange houses and the emerald trade, to launder money.

“The well-established connections between emerald traders and drug trafficking highlight how organized crime is intertwined with both legal and illegal economies, nationally and internationally,” Andres Preciado, director of Colombian think tank Fundación Ideas para la Paz, told InSight Crime.

Enemies of Hernando Sànchez

Another theory is that Horacio Triana, an emerald dealer and Carranza’s historical rival who is serving time in a US prison on drug-related charges, may have wanted Aguilar out of the way.

Triana’s beef with Aguilar likely stems from the dead man’s close association and friendship with Hernando Sànchez, heir to Carranza’s emerald empire. Sánchez inherited control of Colombia’s biggest and most productive mining area — the Santa Rosa — when Carranza died. That put him, and thus, Aguilar, in the business crossfire of rival emerald barrons and traffickers, like Triana, as well as another key player, Pedro Rincon Castillo, known as “Pedro Orejas.”

Sánchez could be at the center of this deadly puzzle, says Baquero. Still a big player in the emerald world, he has survived several assassination attempts, receiving 11 shots in an exclusive Bogotá clothing store in 2012. His immense power, garnered after Carranza’s death, made him an obvious target, but he also faced accusations — notably from Triana — that he owed money for the purchase of shares in the Cunas Mine, which produces a significant amount of gems for Santa Rosa.

Aguilar’s “associates must be very scared and protecting themselves,” said Baquero.

Aligned with Triana in the same emerald faction, Pedro Orejas may have his own motivation for wanting Aguilar out of the picture — again, due to conflict with Sánchez over control of the mines but also over a potential lingering suspicion he could have been involved in his son’s death in 2013.

Although there is no direct evidence, some allege Triana paid a group of assassins for the hit on Sánchez in 2012. Ousting Aguilar, who ran the heavily armed security company, Seguridad Oriental Ltda., that protected Sánchez and other local and international mine owners would leave Sánchez more vulnerable to another attempt on his life.

Sánchez was also fingered by Triana and Pedro Orejas for being a frontman for Lozano, who now resides in Dubai.

Or Could it Be The AGC?

There is yet another possible perpetrator, the Gaitanist Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia – AGC). Although there are no direct links between Aguilar and the AGC (also known as the Clan del Golfo), its former leader, Dario Antonio Úsuga, alias “Otoniel,” who is now in US custody, allegedly ordered hits on Sánchez and had long coveted a piece of the emerald trade in Boyacá. Some media reports say the AGC and Lozano have worked together before.

SEE ALSO: Gaitanistas – Gulf Clan Criminal Profile

Aguilar’s assassination would send a powerful message to Sánchez, whose elimination is important to realize AGC ambitions. But the group, known for getting rid of rivals in pretty sophisticated ways, may have worked with Triana and Pedro Orejas to take out Aguilar in return for a footing in the mining business.

“What’s clear is that Aguilar was on a kill list for some time, it was a homicide already paid for,” said Preciado.

But as investigators continue to grapple with the latest bloodshed in Colombia’s emerald trade, there is only one certainty, and that is that the violence — and sophistication of the hit that claimed Aguilar’s life — will continue. And that will leave more than a few worried.

This article, written by Helen Murphy, was originally published by InSight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America. It has been generously shared with Finance Colombia under a Creative Commons license.

Photo: “El Mocho” of the AGC is one high-profile arrest by the Colombian police. (Credit: Policía Nacional de Colombia)

One of Colombia’s biggest criminal groups is expanding its reach, threatening to disrupt the government’s peace processes with other armed groups, a recent report found.

The report published by the International Crisis Group in March describes how the Gaitanist Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia – AGC) has become the largest armed group not currently involved in formal negotiations under the banner of President Gustavo Petro’s Total Peace (Paz Total) initiative. The report expressed concern that the AGC could interfere with and even sabotage other groups’ peace dialogues as they expand and fight for strategically valuable territory.

With about 9,000 members, the AGC is the largest group involved in drug trafficking in the country, earning additional income through arms trafficking, illegal mining, migrant smuggling, and extortion in many municipalities throughout Colombia’s Caribbean coast.

Petro has managed to start talks with some of the country’s other main criminal groups, including the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – ELN) and the Central General Staff (Estado Mayor Central – EMC) of the ex-FARC mafia. Recently, Petro announced negotiations with the Second Marquetalia (Segunda Marquetalia), another group of FARC dissidents.

Shortly after the report was published, Petro opened the door for a “legal negotiation” with the AGC, which the group publicly accepted under the condition that negotiations are a political process, similar to other groups involved in Paz Total, as opposed to a “sometimiento a la justicia” (submission to justice), which would potentially involve harsher criminal penalties.

InSight Crime spoke with the report’s author, Elizabeth Dickinson, about the potential for peace talks with the AGC as well as some of the report’s main findings:

InSight Crime (IC): Do you think the AGC is genuinely interested in participating in these dialogues?

Elizabeth Dickinson: Yes. The AGC has a disadvantage compared to other groups, as they remain outside ceasefire agreements. For example, in Sur de Bolívar, where the EMC, ELN, and AGC are fighting one another, the military is only targeting the AGC. This strategic constraint on the battlefield is probably their greatest short-term incentive to come to the table.

Two longer-term objectives are also driving the group’s willingness to enter talks. First, there’s a strong desire for legitimacy, which comes with having a seat at the negotiating table with the government. This group fundamentally does not understand why it is the only major armed group in Colombia outside the peace process. And considering the level of control and sophistication they’ve obtained in recent years, the leadership has a chip on its shoulder for not being included in these talks.

The second objective is judicial leniency. Successful peace talks could involve potentially reduced sentences in exchange for providing truthful testimony. Congress will need to establish the specific terms of this arrangement, but this proposition holds particular interest for members of the organization who are interested in finding a way out of this situation of perpetual violence.

The lower-level fighters within the group — young guys aged 18 to 24, who often joined seeking job opportunities — feel that the reality they’ve encountered is not what they anticipated. It is not necessarily a very happy life to live in the ranks of this group, exposed to violence, in difficult environments, and away from home.

That said, some level of noncompliance or criminal interests will continue among the “mandos medios,” the mid-level commanders, who may not have the same incentives to participate in the peace process.

IC: The AGC has perfected the practice of “monetizing territorial control” by profiting off all economic activity, licit and illicit, in areas where they are the dominant actor.  Where is the group trying to expand its control and why? 

Elizabeth Dickinson: If you look at a map, you can understand precisely why they’re expanding where they’re expanding. I would point to three areas.

The first one is the Pacific coast. This group is ambitious to control both coastlines because if one drug trafficking route is down, the other route is open, and there are many different international markets accessible from various routes. They also think this will dramatically increase their political leverage. From their stronghold in Urabá, Antioquia, they have expanded south through Chocó. They are now in Bajo Calima, across the bay from Buenaventura, and they will likely continue into Valle de Cauca, where their expansion is motivated by control of fluvial routes and access to extortion revenues from a very lucrative industrial economy outside of Cali, in Tulua and Buga.

The second focus is mining areas in Bolívar, Antioquia, and Cesar. These are very obviously linked to gold mining, a very attractive product for all armed groups in Colombia, particularly with the market for coca a little bit out of whack. They are systematically pushing the ELN out of its strongholds in mining areas in these places.

The last area of expansion, based on their strategic positioning, seems to be Catatumbo, Norte de Santander, home to the highest concentrations of coca crops, coal mining, palm oil production, and the vast numbers of crossings on the Colombia/Venezuela border. If they were to achieve that, they would dominate the corridor from the Venezuelan border, across the entire Atlantic coast, all the way down to the Pacific coast, an enormous strategic prize.

IC: In the report, you quote one AGC commander saying he envisioned the organization “maintaining its structure and illicit business activities, but just making them less violent.” How is that reconcilable with what the government wants in the long term?

Elizabeth Dickinson: In the short term, all armed groups in Colombia want to continue their armed control and their businesses while reducing violence. Under the previous peace commissioner, the government’s priority was reducing violence and dealing with the territorial control aspect at a later stage.

But if we’re demobilizing a group with as much territorial control as the AGC and as many roots in the economy, the state must be prepared to address the vacuums left behind. And today, that’s simply not possible. In negotiations with the various criminal groups, the planning must start now — from a military perspective, from an institutional perspective, and a services perspective.

IC: The AGC is one of several groups that split off from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia – AUC) when the coalition demobilized in 2006. What has made the AGC stronger and more resilient than other groups that emerged from that process, such as the Rastrojos?

Elizabeth Dickinson: To understand their expansion model, it is crucial to comprehend the organization’s structure. It comprises three branches: military, economic, and political. This structure goes down to the street level. In every town in AGC areas, the community can point to the guy who is the political head, the economic head, and so on. Their expansion involves building a social base, where they have a role in community organizations like the Community Action Boards (Juntas de Acción Comunal – JAC), and they control every aspect of the economy, with the threat of violence lingering in the background in case anyone doesn’t comply.

Another important factor was their relationship with the landowners. A portion of the political and economic classes prefer to live with this group rather than risk exposure to unknown actors, like the ELN, the EMC, or criminal organizations. Those landowner networks have been fundamental for this group’s survival because, in moments of economic scarcity, the landowners would step in and front AGC members’ salaries for a month or two while they got back on their feet.

The other thing that is quite different from groups like the Rastrojos or some urban gangs is that the AGC is not urban. This is a fundamentally rural organization. They have strategically chosen not to make cities their priority. This is not an organization inside Barranquilla. They’re sitting on the perimeter, letting the gangs in the city fight it out while they wait for a winner to decide who to work with. Existing mainly in the countryside has helped them avoid scrutiny and security operations.

IC: After the capture of Dairo Antonio Úsuga, alias “Otoniel,” in 2021, the group’s new leader, Jobanis de Jesús Ávila Villadiego, alias “Chiquito Malo,” has tightened his grip on the organization, according to the report. How has the group’s structure changed with this change of leadership?

Elizabeth Dickinson: One way this group expanded was through a franchising model, which is still part of the organization’s DNA. At a local level, commanders have autonomy over extortion and low-revenue criminal economies, bringing in money for their specific bloc or front. But the big games like drug trafficking and mining are run by the Estado Mayor (central command).

When Otoniel was captured, there were some questions about whether this organization would even stay together. So Chiquito Malo took an aggressive stance towards consolidation, sending several envoys across the region to negotiate with the different fronts and bring them all on board. He’s also replaced local and mid-level commanders across the region in cases where the envoys were not enough to get them on board with the structure.

IC: The market for coca leaves remains inconsistent throughout Colombia, with prices varying considerably by region. However, the report found prices in AGC territory remained stable. How has the AGC achieved this despite falling prices in areas controlled by other groups? 

Elizabeth Dickinson: There are a few hypotheses. The buyer relationship is the most powerful explanation of what’s happening in the market. The AGC has a consistent buyer relationship with international cartels, principally the Sinaloa Cartel on the Atlantic coast, but also with European organized crime. In a situation of oversupply, like we now have in Colombia, where there is too much coca, it’s a buyer’s market, and the buyers get to choose who they work with. And the AGC has essentially won that buyer’s market.

The AGC has a few advantages that make it the obvious candidate. First, its territories are consolidated. They are the only ones participating in drug trafficking in areas they control. So, when traffickers enter an AGC area to buy coca or organize a shipment, they’re not worried, for example, about which group controls the exit routes that specific day. By contrast, in Nariño, one trafficker might have to pay four different extortion fees because there are so many groups present.

The second advantage they have is transportation. The infrastructure on the Atlantic coast is vastly superior to that in southern Colombia. The Atlantic coast has the Troncal del Caribe highway, significant ports in Barranquilla and Cartagena, and developed fluvial routes.

Third, the AGC has been able to penetrate security forces at a local level — and it’s very much at the local level, not systematic. We are talking about an organization that can buy off specific police and military officials, making them very consistent suppliers.

Fourth, because they’re so successful in the cocaine business, they have tons of capital. If a shipment gets lost, the AGC will guarantee payment to the buyer. This also helps explain why coca prices have been stable because even if the market price has dropped, the AGC has the money to say, we’ll just pay our coca growers slightly more because it will keep us popular in these areas.

This interview has been edited for clarity and fluidity.

This article, produced by Henry Shuldiner, was originally published by InSight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

“A sentence of 45 years or 540 months imprisonment is sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to achieve the sentencing objectives,” the authority said in in a letter to Judge Dora Irizarry that was revealed by El Tiempo newspaper last week. Otoniel, continued the district attorney’s office, was the leader “of a powerful and violent terrorist, paramilitary, and drug trafficking organization based in Colombia that engaged in countless acts of violence, responsible for the extensive distribution of cocaine shipments into the United States.”

Otoniel, who was one of the most violent actors in Colombia’s armed conflict, would receive the highest sentence imposed on a Colombian drug trafficker if these sentencing recommendations are followed by the court. Sentencing in the United States by Judge Dora Irizarry is scheduled for August 8.

According to the request made by Otoniel’s lawyer to submit himself to the JEP (Special Jurisdiction for Peace), a body born out of the Havana Agreement to help facilitate the nation’s 2016 peace agreement, he has been directly involved in the internal armed conflict since 1986.

He joined the FARC’s V front as a militia member before serving as a guerrilla in the Popular Liberation Army (EPL) from 1988 to 1991. He later became a member of the dissidents of the EPL “Bernardo Franco” from 1992 to 1995. This followed immediately after the demobilization of the EPL Dissidents “Bernardo Franco, “which was concerted, planned, and executed by the Fourth Brigade of the army in complicity with the paramilitary group Autodefensas Unidas de Córdoba y Urabá (ACCU),” according to the document.

The operation involved the military commanders of the IV Brigade ordering Lieutenant Colonel Jesús María Clavijo to receive the dissident guerrillas in the Granadino battalion, recruit them for the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), and organize the device to transport them in army trucks and helicopters to the “Cedro cocido” farm owned by Fidel Castaño in a rural area of Montería (Córdoba). Otoniel became a paramilitary commander of the Centauros block of the AUC and other paramilitary structures from 1995 until August 15, 2006, when he demobilized during the negotiation process between the government of President Álvaro Uribe Vélez and the AUC, within the framework of Law 782 of 2002.

However, he was later excluded by the Superior Court of Bogotá, Justice, and Peace Chamber and is currently under investigation with an arrest warrant for the crimes of aggravated conspiracy to commit a crime, trafficking and carrying of narcotics, aggravated homicide, and other crimes.

In a five-hour testimony, the paramilitary leader mentioned former presidential candidate Luis Pérez; Liberal Party Senator Miguel Ángel Pinto; former Congress members Milton Rodríguez Sarmiento, Jorge Camilo Abril Tarache, and Carlos Cárdenas Ortiz; former Justice Minister Sabas Pretelt de la Vega; former DAS director Jorge Noguera; deputy director of DAS, Orlando Rivas Tovar; and former governors of Casanare William Hernán Peláez, Miguel Ángel Pérez Suárez, and Óscar Raúl Iván Flórez.

This article was written by Santiago Ramírez Baquero.

In a recent testimony before the Colombian transitional justice system, one of the most important commanders of the AUC outlined the former paramilitary group’s ties to high-profile politicians, businesses, and military commanders.

Salvatore Mancuso Gómez, a former commander of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia – AUC), gave testimony via video call before the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz – JEP) between May 11 and 16. The JEP investigates human rights violations during Colombia’s armed conflict, in which the AUC played a leading and violent role.

Mancuso was behind the expansion of paramilitary groups into northern Colombia between 1994 and 2004, and led several AUC blocs in the departments of Córdoba and Norte de Santander. In the early 2000s, the AUC reached a peace agreement with the Colombian government, although many refused to demobilize and formed new criminal groups. Mancuso was extradited along with other paramilitary leaders to the United States in 2008, where he was sentenced to nearly 16 years in prison for drug trafficking.

Mancuso was released from prison in 2020 and remains in the US. He is now seeking a reduced sentence in Colombia, where he is accused of 5,200 violent crimes, including homicide, forced disappearance, and gender-based violence, among others. The current hearings represent his last chance for a commuted sentence through the JEP, if he can demonstrate, with new information, his role as a linchpin between state agents and paramilitary groups.

Below, InSight Crime presents the main elements of Mancuso’s account of the AUC’s expansive criminal network and its exponential growth in the early 2000s. If corroborated, the claims would illustrate the paramilitaries’ degree of influence and political connections.

The Political Strength of the AUC

During the hearings, Mancuso claimed that the AUC directly intervened in Colombia’s 1998 and 2002 presidential elections.

“There was support in elections, for example, for [Senator] Horacio Serpa, for President [Andrés] Pastrana himself, and for [Álvaro] Uribe,” Mancuso told the JEP. He did not provide many details and asked to elaborate on this issue in a more restricted hearing for security reasons.

Mancuso also claimed that former Vice President Francisco Santos (2002-2010) asked him to form the AUC’s Capital Bloc to fight left-wing guerrillas’ presence in urban areas following the advance of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC) into Bogota.

In response, former President Andrés Pastrana (1998-2002) accused Mancuso of false testimony and filed a complaint with the Colombian Attorney General’s Office for slander and libel. Álvaro Uribe, who was president from 2002 to 2010, published a statement denying that he received help from paramilitaries during his campaign.

The paramilitaries’ political links are well established. More than 250 political leaders, among them 72 congressmen and 15 governors, have been convicted for links to the AUC, in a scandal known as “parapolitics.”

“We set up networks that allowed us to legitimize the political movement, the political discourse, the actions of the self-defense forces,” Mancuso told the JEP.

Paramilitary Cemeteries in Venezuela

Mancuso, who led the Catatumbo bloc in Norte de Santander on Colombia’s northeastern border, said that the bloc buried its victims of forced disappearance in mass graves in Venezuela, with the knowledge of Venezuelan and Colombian armed forces.

“There are self-defense groups’ grave sites there — more than 200 dead bodies of people in San Cristóbal, in Ureña, in San Antonio, in La Fría and in Boca de Grita,” he said.

Forced disappearances were ordered by high-ranking Colombian military commanders, according to Mancuso, who explained that clandestine graves in Venezuela were used to keep the number of known victims in Colombia low.

InSight Crime recently visited Norte de Santander, where expert human rights sources who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed that forced disappearances by armed groups in the area continue.

False Demobilizations

Officially, one faction of the Popular Liberation Army (Ejército Popular de Liberación – EPL) guerrillas in northwestern Urabá demobilized in 1996. But, according to Mancuso, most of the weapons and men from this process ended up in the ranks of the AUC, and the Colombian government knew.

“We exchanged some weapons, we kept the best weapons that the EPL had, and we gave them the oldest weapons of the self-defense groups,” said Mancuso. “This demobilization took place with a semblance of legality, but what was really done was to transfer the EPL guerrillas to the self-defense forces.”

Mancuso outlined the case of Dairo Antonio Úsuga, alias “Otoniel.” Until his capture in October 2021, Otoniel was the main leader of the Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia – AGC), also known as the Urabeños. Otoniel and his brother, Juan de Dios Úsuga, alias “Giovanny,” were part of the EPL in the 1990s, and after the demobilization process, joined the ranks of the self-defense groups.

Like Mancuso, Otoniel appeared before the JEP to testify about his criminal history. He also confirmed that former guerrillas joined paramilitary groups following the EPL’s demobilization.

Corporate Connections

Private companies have played a large role in financing and expanding paramilitarism in Colombia. Soft drink giant Postobón has been accused of supporting paramilitarism with monthly payments or contributions through national distribution networks by several former paramilitary leaders, including Mancuso, who repeated the claims in the recent hearings. He also mentioned payments by the Bogotá-based brewery, Bavaria, and that three banana companies, including multinational Chiquita, paid 3 cents on the dollar for each box of bananas exported. These profits were distributed among paramilitaries, the vigilante cooperatives known as Convivir, and military commanders.

Mancuso also claimed that Colombia’s state-owned oil company, Ecopetrol, allowed paramilitaries to steal fuel from feeder pipes, even sharing pumping schedules with them. The fuel was then sold at service stations in territories under paramilitary control.

The multinational coal company, Drummond, which has been investigated in the past for alleged links to paramilitarism, also came up in the hearings. Mancuso said that Drummond’s head of security gave paramilitaries lists of names of union members who were then killed by the AUC.

In April, former paramilitary member Jairo de Jesús Charris also testified about this issue to the JEP. In response, Drummond published a statement denying any ties to illegal groups and insisting that there is a cartel of false witnesses against the company.

To date, none of the companies have responded to Mancuso’s recent claims.

This article, written by Sara Garcia, was originally published by Insight Crime, a Medellín-based foundation dedicated to the investigation and analysis of crime and security in Colombia and Latin America.

Otoniel, who was arrested in October 2021 and extradited by Colombia to the US, pleaded guilty to drug trafficking, running a criminal enterprise, and manufacturing and distributing cocaine. His charges mean that he will likely receive at least 20 years in prison and potentially a life sentence. United States District Judge Dora L. Irizarry also ordered Otoniel to pay $216 million in addition to fines, a DOJ press release reported.

Otoniel’s legal name iss Dairo Antonio Úsuga David

“With today’s guilty plea, the bloody reign of the most violent and significant Colombian narcotics trafficker since Pablo Escobar is over,” U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said. “Úsuga David has now been held accountable for his leadership of the Clan del Golfo, which was responsible for trafficking tons of illegal narcotics from Colombia to the United States.”

Otoniel, whose real name is Dairo Antonio Úsuga David, is the leader of the Clan del Golfo (Gulf Clan), a drug trafficking group that is based in  Colombia’s Gulf of Urabá on the country’s Caribbean coast that mostly trafficked cocaine for other cartels in Latin America and exported the narcotics the United States, according to El Diario.

Using this vast power over the trade and his base in an area close to the Colombia-Panama border, Otoniel gained control of much of the Urabá region of Antioquia, Colombia. In his plea, he has confessed to trafficking as much as 96,800 kilograms of cocaine through the region.

The Clan del Golfo group is also among the most violent drug traffickers in the world,reportedly having as many as 6,000 members, including an army of hitmen that committed murders, kidnappings, and other illegal activities against their enemies in the region.

His capture in 2021, and the lack of strong leadership to replace him in the Clan del Golfo, has cast doubt over Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s plans for “Total Peace” in the country through negotiations with gangs and other armed groups. Petro’s administration has identified Chiquito Malo as Otoniel’s successor, but attempts to start negotiations with him have been unsuccessful, InSight Crime reported.

Petro’s plans for total peace in Colombia come after decades of conflict between the government, armed paramilitary groups, and rebel groups in the country. His administration is currently negotiating with the National Liberation Army (ELN) towards a peace deal that mirrors the 2016 one with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

Colombia’s Truth Commission’s report in June 2022 about potential changes to be made in how the country handles its drug trafficking problem is being seriously considered by Petro’s administration. Some, like a reduction of forced coca plant eradication, is currently being applied to its policy change, al-Jazeera reported.

Colombia has voted for change in Petro. But, in terms of the fight against organized crime, what shape will this change take?

This article generously shared by Insight Crime. The original can be read here.

Deforestation appears unstoppable. The production of cocaine continues virtually unabated. Major criminal groups, such as the ELN and the ex-FARC Mafia, pose severe threats across Colombia while a newer generation of urban gangs threaten cities. And finally, what of the relationship with Venezuela, which Gustavo Petro has pledged to repair, despite the regime of President Nicolás Maduro having harbored and even aided guerrilla groups.

Here, InSight Crime analyzes five security challenges awaiting the new president-elect head-on once he enters the Palace of Nariño in August.

The Beating Heart of the Global Cocaine Trade

Despite a slight decline in total coca crops in 2019 and 2020, Colombia remains far and away the world’s largest cocaine producer.

According to figures from the United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC), while crops have decreased for four years in a row, crop yields and overall cocaine production are at an all-time high. What’s more, about half of all coca is being farmed in protected areas, such as environmental reserves, Indigenous reservations or Afro-Colombian communities. Furthermore, little to no progress has been made in changing the dynamics in traditional hotspots for coca crops, such as the southern department of Nariño, or Norte de Santander, along the border with Venezuela.

Eradication efforts have shown little long-term impact. According to the UNODC, half of all cleared areas quickly showed signs of replanting and 37 percent of such areas saw new coca crops planted within 500 meters. Additionally, the use of forced eradication remains controversial and the National Crop Substitution Plan, which was supposed to encourage coca farmers to voluntarily move away from the trade by supporting them in developing alternative crops, has stagnated. This has all generated deep mistrust of government policies in coca-growing areas.

Furthermore, the process of extracting cocaine hydrochloride is becoming more effective, with crystallizers able to produce more cocaine than ever. The potential production of cocaine increased from 6.7 kilograms per hectare in 2019 to 7.9 kilograms in 2020, according to the UNODC. This means that approximately 1,228 tons of cocaine can be produced in Colombia every year.

SEE ALSO: Colombia’s Cocaine Keeps On Reaching New Heights: UNODC Report

This naturally has had a major positive effect for organized crime groups. More cocaine means a more constant flow of weapons and money, which in turn means an ability to secure control and expand their territory. The presence of Mexican, Italian and Balkan cartels has also had a direct impact on the demand for more cocaine hydrochloride.

Petro cannot solve the problem alone. Relations with Venezuela will remain the most pressing international obstacle to solving drug trafficking, while shipments to Ecuador have become a huge driver of violence in that country. Cocaine connections to Brazil, Panama and the Caribbean will also require a multilateral approach.

Is the FARC Peace Deal Still Salvageable?

The peace agreement reached in 2016 between the government and the now-demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC) is in real trouble. Coca substitution plans have stalled, violence in certain parts of Colombia has worsened and former FARC fighters are regularly threatened and killed.

At a purely legislative level, the Kroc Institute for Peace Studies has estimated that 37 percent of the provisions of the peace agreement have seen only minimal progress. Access to land and viable economic projects for those who laid down their weapons remains difficult.

At the 2021 UN General Assembly, outgoing president Iván Duque highlighted progress made on the agreement during his tenure, although recognizing that criminal groups remained a major obstacle.

The figures do not show much progress. According to figures from the Institute for Development and Peace Studies (Indepaz), 21 former combatants and 86 social leaders and human rights defenders have been killed in Colombia this year alone. During the Duque government to date, at least 930 people belonging to these categories have been assassinated. Not all of these can be directly associated to organized crime. But a large portion of these slain activists were directly working on the implementation of the FARC peace deal, including crop substitution and land restitution.

According to Mateo Gómez, a researcher at Barómetro quoted by the newspaper El Espectador, caring for ex-combatants and those forcibly displaced by violence will be an urgent issue for Gustavo Petro’s incoming government.

The Expansion of Colombia’s Criminal Groups

Of Colombia’s roster of criminal groups, three present the largest problems.

The National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – ELN) is arguably in the best position to be a major thorn in the side of Gustavo Petro. While its major enemies have been decimated by criminal rivalries and government action, the ELN has consolidated its presence in Venezuela, taking over many of the spaces left behind by the FARC, and is particularly strong in the border area.

Figuring out how to deal with the ELN will be one of Petro’s foremost priorities. Since the collapse of peace talks in January 2019, after the ELN bombed a police training school, the group has expanded rapidly. While its leadership has expressed itself ready to return to the negotiating table, it showed its strength in February 2022, by paralyzing large parts of the country with a series of coordinated strikes. Any conciliation will be made more difficult by the fact the ELN appears to have at least the tacit approval of Venezuela’s President Maduro to continue its criminal activities in exchange for a cut of the profits.

The dissident FARC, known as the ex-FARC Mafia, are in a precarious state. They remain powerful but fractured and leaderless after a series of targeted strikes has killed many of their commanders in the last 18 months.

Both the major factions of FARC rebels have suffered heavy losses, with the Second Marquetalia in particular now severely weakened. Its commander, Luciano Marín, alias “Iván Márquez,” has not been heard of for many months and could either be in hiding or trying to rebuild his group.

But the ex-FARC Mafia remain strong, especially in the south and the Pacific, commanded by Néstor Gregorio Vera, alias “Iván Mordisco.” However, a series of new leaders have emerged, with less loyalty to the FARC’s political ideologies and more focus on criminal income.

And the Urabeños, also known as the Gulf Clan (Clan del Golfo) or the  the Gaitanist Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia – AGC), have been battered but still have potential to cause nationwide problems.

After their leader, Dairo Antonio Úsuga, alias “Otoniel,” was extradited to the United States in May 2022, the group’s cohesion has been in doubt. While the Urabeños have always allowed franchise gangs to operate with some degree of autonomy, recent actions by said franchises have not seemed aligned. This risks forcing Petro to deal with highly active, smaller gangs, who will fight tooth and nail to defend their small part of an overall criminal economy, such as a drug trafficking route.

A similar scenario is already taking place in cities where smaller gangs are fighting for control of microtrafficking and international routes. In the north, the Pachenca have been terrorizing Santa Marta and the Costeños have been fighting for control of drug trafficking in Barranquilla. The Mexicanos and the Local have been staking claims to parts of the Colombian Pacific, the Cordillera has tried to extend its dominance from the southern state of Nariño and La Oficina as always has had a part to play in Medellín.

The Border with Venezuela

For Gustavo Petro, Venezuela may seem like a multi-headed hydra. The ELN and ex-FARC Mafia have grown rapidly in the country. Homegrown Venezuelan gangs are making their mark on Colombian soil. The government of President Maduro has revealed itself to be, if not a facilitator, at least a regulator of the cocaine trade. Human smuggling, contraband and environmental crimes are also rife between the two countries. And there is little to no communication set up between Caracas and Bogotá.

In Norte de Santander, on the Colombian side of the border, the ELN has made itself the dominant criminal actor in the coca-growing enclave of Catatumbo, while continuing its expansion into the interior of Venezuela. The Urabeños are actively trying to establish control of Cúcuta, arguably the most vital criminal crossroads along the border. They also control remote trails between Puerto Santander and San Antonio del Táchira, along which migrants are extorted. And the Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua, is clinging on to control of its own cross-border trails, despite facing a war with the ELN.

Further south, outbreaks of violence in Apure and Arauca continue to affect the civilian population. In 2021, during a prolonged fight between the Venezuelan government and the dissident FARC 10^th Front, an estimated 6,000 people were displaced and fled into Colombia. Continuing violence in the area, now involving the ELN, has seen this figure continue to increase, placing a humanitarian crisis into Petro’s hands.

Migration, in general, will be a vital issue for Petro to deal with. Around 2 million Venezuelans have fled to Colombia, many of whom live in economically precarious situations and have been preyed on by criminal groups for recruitment, extortion and more.

The Advance of Environmental Plunder

Successive Colombian governments have stalled in their duties as custodians of the Amazon. Since 2017, 220,000 hectares of forest cover have been lost.

Petro will have to learn from this recent political history. Government initiatives to curb deforestation have been tried. None have lasted for long.

And while specific areas have shown reductions in deforestation, the problem has worsened elsewhere. In 2018, although the total number of hectares deforested fell to 197,159 ha, rates increased drastically in the departments of Meta and Putumayo.

Same story in 2019 when, despite another overall drop, the northern departments of Chocó and Norte de Santander saw deforestation increase. This was heavily linked to the spread of other criminal economies, such as illegal mining and coca cultivation.

According to Rodrigo Botero, director of the Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development, this will be one of Petro’s main environmental challenges. Instead of a national approach, Botero suggested that the new government should measure deforestation rates in terms of the forest cover remaining in highly vulnerable areas.

Even in 2022, deforestation is concentrated in similar places. National parks and other protected areas in Meta, Caquetá and Guaviare account for the bulk of deforestation, according to Colombia’s Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology and Environmental Studies (Instituto de Hidrología, Meteorología y Estudios Ambientales – IDEAM).

The new government will also have to tackle both the legal and illegal drivers of such deforestation. As extensively explored by InSight Crime, the likes of the ELN and ex-FARC Mafia encourage the burning of forests and building of illegal roads through the jungle to further drug trafficking and illegal mining.

However, cattle ranching and palm cultivation remain by far the largest causes of deforestation in Colombia. While legal, these are fed by the illegal appropriate of land, a crime that has received little visibility to date and benefits certain political and business elites.

This practice sees large parcels illegally occupied and the communities living there forcibly displaced. The forest is then cut down and turned into land for pasture. Extortion of nearby communities and money laundering through the forestry trade are common.

A recently created Law for Environmental Crimes, passed in 2021, marks such land appropriation as a crime. But the new president will have to actively confront this criminal economy often hidden in plain sight.

This article by Juan Diego Posada, Juan Diego Cárdenas, and Lara Loaiza has beengenerously shared by Insight Crime under a creative commons license. The original can be read here.

But, after years on the run from authorities, is Úsuga, alias “Otoniel,” still as important a drug kingpin as he once was? Does his arrest carry the immediate consequences for Colombian drug trafficking as authorities are making out?

This article generously shared by Insight Crime. The original can be read here.

Here, InSight Crime examines three essential aspects of Otoniel’s arrest: his place in drug trafficking history, the number of men and money that went toward his capture and the consequences for the vast criminal network he once oversaw.

1. Otoniel was not Escobar

In the hours after Otoniel’s capture, a triumphant President Iván Duque said that “this is the hardest blow that has been dealt to drug trafficking in this century…and is only comparable to the fall of Pablo Escobar in the 1990s.”

There were apparent similarities in the way they both fell. The two drug lords had dedicated task forces after them. The Search Bloc (Bloque de Búsqueda) was created in 1986 to bring down Escobar. Their mission took seven years and a fortune to complete. Otoniel was tracked by a task force of thousands of soldiers in Operation Agamemnon, founded in 2015 to fight the Urabeños. Their mission took six years and a fortune to complete.

SEE ALSO: Profile of Dario Antonio Úsuga, alias ‘Otoniel’

Both oversaw major drug trafficking organizations that were on the decline at the time of their death or capture. The power of the Medellín Cartel, founded by Escobar, had already begun to decline severely by the time he was shot on a rooftop in 1993. Prior to this, attention from authorities had led to the capture and killing of other top Medellín Cartel figures, weakening the organization from within. Pressure from the Cali Cartel, which stood all too ready to fill the drug trafficking void, only hurried its demise.

Otoniel’s Urabeños are also not what they once were. After the demobilization of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia – AUC) in 2006, the Urabeños broke off and rapidly spread across the country. By 2012, the group was the premier drug trafficking organization in Colombia. However, the country’s cocaine production was such that the Urabeños never had the monopoly the Medellín Cartel once had. Escobar’s organization once handled 80 percent of the world’s cocaine.

While the Urabeños have a sizeable nationwide presence, handling colossal amounts of cocaine, the horizontal nature of the group’s command structure means that Otoniel has not had the single-handed power that Escobar once wielded. Under the control of a “board of directors,” Urabeños leaders sent key lieutenants to open up their own drug trafficking operations across Colombia, seeking control of coca crops, cocaine production and distribution through alliances or violence.

This form of horizontal control worked wonders for the group at the time of its ascendancy. And while the Urabeños remain among Colombia’s major criminal threats, Otoniel was no longer in a position to exert direct control over these disparate groups, given that he spent recent years constantly on the run.

2. The Cost of Bringing Down Otoniel

Ending Otoniel’s years on the run did not come cheap. Since February 2015, Colombian police have hunted the Urabeños as part of the most extensive action against organized crime in the country: Operation Agamemnon.

While it was initially conceived as a short-term operation to hit hard, some 1,200 soldiers and police deployed into the Urabá region with two clear missions: dismantle the Urabeños and capture Otoniel.

Two years later, and with neither of those objectives achieved, the operation was renewed and strengthened. Agamemnon II brought in extra resources from the army, judiciary and Attorney General’s Office.

By early 2021, the operation counted some 3,000 security personnel, according to general Fernando Murillo Orrego, director of Colombia’s judiciary police.

So what did all these troops have to show for it? In an interview with El Tiempo in January 2021, Murillo Orrego said that Agamemnon troops had carried out 1,420 operations in the northern departments of Antioquia, Córdoba, Chocó and Sucre and had arrested over 4,000 people.

Agamemnon’s mission statement involves dismantling one of the most powerful drug trafficking groups in Latin America, with international connections and local support. Still, over the last seven years, it has involved large-scale expenditure. While the amount of money invested by the Colombian government has not been revealed, Agamemnon has not succeeded in its most ambitious objective.

Duque has insisted that Otoniel’s capture marks “the end of the Gulf Clan.” This is false. The group still has about 1,700 active members, according to Colombian police. Many of these are unlikely to be particularly loyal to Otoniel, whose leadership of the group has faded in recent years.

SEE ALSO: Urabeños Leadership Under Mounting Pressure in Colombia

3. What’s Next for the Urabeños?

The Colombian Army finally got their man after years of rumors and anticipation. But will this sustained pressure also weaken the group he once led?

The horizontal nature of the Urabeños means that specific regional leaders may see their loyalties to the group weaken and strike out alone.

But some of the group’s commanders may seek to maintain nationwide sway. Wilmer Antonio Giralda Quiroz, alias “Siopas,” identified as Otoniel’s second-in-command, could try to take control from his base in the northern department of Chocó. He may find a rival in Ávila Villadiego, alias “Chiquito Malo,” who was an ally of Otoniel’s for almost 20 years. Villadiego was reportedly in charge of coordinating the group’s cocaine trafficking operations and is wanted by the United States.

Other factors will help the group survive: They currently control some of the most important coca production areas and drug trafficking routes in Colombia, as well as having the men, the weapons and the contacts to send new shipments out.

The group’s five main armed structures are based in and around the departments of Antioquia, Chocó, Sucre, Bolívar and Córdoba. These all have commanders who came up under Otoniel or were appointed by those closest to him.

While these core groups could break out into internecine violence, there is a greater likelihood of bloodshed in regions where the Urabeños designated control to “franchises.” These franchises were developed by the Urabeños, who sought to co-opt local gangs across Colombia. While such backing might temporarily prove useful to the criminal groups, the arrest of Otoniel is likely to fray ties between Urabeños and their franchisees.

This could be reflected in regions such as Norte de Santander, a crucial coca crop area along the Venezuelan border where the Urabeños are engaged in a long-term fight with the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – ELN). The same could happen in other crucial parts of Colombia, such as Nariño, along the border with Ecuador, or northern Colombia, where the Urabeños are present in the strategic cities of Santa Marta and Barranquilla. These groups could well decide that going it alone makes better financial sense than maintaining loyalty to a central unit that no longer exists.

This article generously shared by Insight Crime. The original can be read here.