The national army carries out a military operation against the pseudonym “Gentil Duarte”

The National Army on Thursday launched military operations against the leader of FARC dissidents, Miguel Botache Santillana, alias ‘Gentil Duarte’, in the south-east of the country.

This is an operation led by the Joint Command of Special Operations (COES) in which this would be the camp where this leader resides. It was located by military intelligence, between the departments of Guaviare and Caquetá.

‘Gentil Duarte’ is responsible for directing the seventh dissident front in the south and east of the country. Born in Florencia, Caquetá, in 1963, Duarte joined the 14th Front des Farc at the age of 18, and thanks to his ease of communication and his charisma, he won the trust of guerrilla leaders such as’Mono Jojoy ‘and’ Alfonso Cano ‘.

Duarte quickly rose to the top of the criminal structure. He became the commander of Block 7, which controlled extortion and drug trafficking in the Meta Department, he became one of the most powerful narco-guerrillas and, since 2009, he held a post at the general staff of the eastern bloc of the FARC-EP.

Years later, like the other powerful men of the old guerrillas, Gentil Duarte was part of the FARC-EP negotiating team in Havana, to reach the Peace Accord. However, in 2016, Botache Santillana shone in anticipating the breakdown of it by both sides and was the first guerrilla to become a dissident, thus forming his own illegal army to continue his criminal life.

In the X Conference of Farc held in September 2016 in the Llanos del Yarí, was Gentil Duarte’s last appearance as a peace negotiator, that day, although he interacted with officials and reporters, danced and was friendly, the guerrillas decided to quit the negotiation. According to the digital portal, with an order from Tymoshenko, Duarte traveled to the Guaviare jungle in search of Iván Mordisco.

What he saw when he arrived at the scene was the dissatisfaction of many fighters with the negotiations and they were determined to continue the armed struggle. Next to Mordisco was John 40, his disciple, who was second in command of the first front., in addition, Giovanny Chuspas, Julián Chollo and Euclides Mora. The rest of the story is not very difficult to guess, Gentil Duarte went from speaker to leader and, through his influence, became the great leader of the dissidents who were just beginning to form.

In November 2016, the general direction of the FARC announced the expulsion of Duarte, which was indifferent to him, since he was arming an army of more than 1,500 armed men who would be fed by drug trafficking.

Since then, according to the InSight Crime portal, Gentil Duarte fought to unite the forces of dissidents spread across the country. Currently, the dissident leads the subversive groups that operate in Arauca, Vichada, Guainía, Meta, Guaviare, Vaupés, Amazonas, Caquetá, Putumayo, Nariño, Cauca and Antioquia.

Authorities have determined that the Seventh Dissident Front, led by Botache, is the largest and strongest, Defense Minister Diego Molano said, this group is responsible for “Recruitment of minors, attacks against the public force, kidnapping and illegal extraction of minerals”, as quoted by El Heraldo.

Among his most recent criminal actions “There is the kidnapping and subsequent murder of the national army second lieutenant Carlos Arturo Becerra, in the municipality of Puerto Concordia (Meta) ”.

KEEP READING: