Following the impact of the public hearing in which 21 soldiers, a former DAS detective and two civilian recruiters acknowledged their responsibility for 296 false alarms, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) decided to add another day to its agenda in Yopal (Casanare). extend ). ).
So far in the meeting, which was scheduled for Monday and Tuesday only, members of Gaula, Delta Group and the 44th Infantry Battalion, assigned to the 16th Brigade, have shared how they stigmatize the population, single out vulnerable people and In the end the goal was achieved, saving the lives of almost 300 innocent people.
Due to the nature of the proceedings, the relatives of the murdered victims had confrontations with those appearing, in which they demanded the full truth, with clear statements and accurate descriptions.
With this, the hearing had to be interrupted, but in order to adapt the process to the necessary search for redress, the judges Óscar Parra and Catalina Díaz, rapporteurs of Macrocaso 03, which investigates “false positives”, decided to extend the public hearing until Wednesday September 20 .
The stories so far tell of false checkpoints, burning of documents, fictitious reports, and awarding of prizes for increasing the reported number of combat casualties.
One of the officers highlighted that day was General (r) Carlos Suárez Bustamante, former army inspector.
Lieutenant (r) Jhon Suancha, a member of the Casanare Gaula, described him as a “father of omission” who took advantage of his position as an inspector to cover up the crimes and conspire to add them to the list of corpses .
“He ordered all Gaula facilities to be evacuated and me to be alone with him in the Gaula crisis room, and my general told me in a cold voice, ‘Hey, the army doesn’t spend that much money on your training so you can do this .’ Come and torture me now.” Or doesn’t he want to be captain? General Carlos Suárez Bustamante, Inspector General of the Army, asked me directly about the losses,” Suancha recalls.
On the other hand, Lucy Yadira Ochoa, daughter of farmer Fermín Ochoa, whom the army murdered in 2007, questioned retired lieutenant Marco Fabián García, whom she accused of being a liar. The former soldier said he knew Lucy’s father, although he claimed the opposite in 2019, before the special court.
“You’re lying, you didn’t know my father,” accused the daughter of the farmer who was falsely accused of being a guerrilla informant 16 years ago. García admitted that he had lied and the judge reminded him that such a gesture was serious.
Those appearing have read lists of people with first and last names who emphasize that, although they were then accused of being “bandits,” they can now affirm that “they were not combatants or criminals, nor were they part of one such were”. criminal organization.
Many of the victims present in the auditorium of the Chamber of Commerce of Casanare, where there is a characteristic sign reading “Who gave the order?”, are still not satisfied.
