What is behind the attacks of the Nicolás Maduro regime against the guerrillas on the border between Venezuela and Colombia

The only ones who knew for sure the day and the almost exact time Bolivarian National Armed Force (FANB) would attack a few kilometers from La Victoria in To hurry up, were the occupants of the dissident camp of the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC), under the command of Miguel Botache Santillana alias Gentle Duarte in front of Jesus Santrich e Ivan Marquez, the leaders of New Marquetalia.

In this third attack on FARC dissidentsWhat is very clear is that the Venezuelan army is only attacking part of this group to force them to leave the occupied territory.

The armed forces reported that several “soldiers were injured and Major Edward Ramón Corobo Segovia and First Lieutenant Yonathan Miguel Duarte died”. Once again, it will be relatives and their friends who will mourn the slain officer, as happened years before in Amazonas, El Catatumbo, Apure, Táchira, among other places where Venezuelan soldiers fell. .

In what could be the most perverse use of Venezuelan soldiers, the Armed Forces (FANB) would be used to eliminate internal adversaries that within the FARC, they have Jesús Santrich and Iván Márquez, to whom Nicolás Maduro expressed his sympathy. The dissidence of the FARC, since the Secretariat disappeared after the peace agreements, is varied, they are different groups and without any factor of ideological cohesion.

The borders of Venezuela are flogged and impregnated, for years, but with greater tolerance since the Bolivarian revolution came to power, and more openly with Nicolás Maduro; the high government allowed the National Liberation Army (ELN) operates with power, armed, in uniform and uses young Venezuelans as combatants in various states of the country.

Thus, the struggle of the armed forces, led by the minister, Vladimir Padrino López and the strategic operations commander, Remigio Ceballos Ichaso, He does not fight the guerrilla in its entirety, but only the dissidence of the FARC who did not want to subordinate pseudonyms Jesus Santrich.

Among those who rebel against New Marquetalia is the group of Gentle Duarte, allied to Jorge Eliécer Jiménez Martínez alias Arturo, who with Fabian Guevara Carrascal alias Farley they controlled the territory of Apure (Venezuela) at the height of Arauquita: It was their camps that were attacked by the FANB.

On the morning of Saturday, March 21, residents of La Victoria, Apure state, observed the flight over the K8 plane, a plane that Venezuela owns in two air groups, Group 15 at the Rafael Urdaneta base. in Maracaibo and group 12 in Vicente Landaeta Gil Air. Base in Barquisimeto.

The official version

Yesterday there was silence from the military high command and today Monday the defense minister issued a statement announcing that “clashes with irregular groups have taken place” without indicating the name of the group.

He added that “one of the leaders known by the pseudonyms The Nando, captured 32 subjects, destroyed six camps and confiscated weapons, ammunition, explosives, war material, vehicles and drugs ”.

On the side of Colombia, Etelivar Torres Vargas, the mayor of Arauquita, a town opposite La Victoria only separated by the Cutufí and Arauca rivers, said in statements to Colombian media that they were preparing to receive the displaced population of both nationalities, as it happens, because a large number of border residents of La Victoria, Arenales, Sector 8, El Ripial and Guafitas, crossed the border trying to escape the consequences of the military operation.

The secretary of the government of Arauquita, Juan Carlos Agudelo, Told BluRadio Colombia that “from the first hours, an operation of the Venezuelan armed forces began on their territory, and they heard shelling and gunshots”.

Colombian soldiers guard the San Lorenzo de Arauquita hospital, which was ready to receive the wounded arriving from the Venezuelan side.

The military operation

In Venezuelan territory panic was felt among border residents in Apure, even in Arauquita (Colombia), they were alarmed by the explosions and the fire from helicopters, as well as the rifles that the soldiers and the guerrillas fired on the ground.

Several propaganda sources have attempted to show that the FANB’s reaction was due to the fact that on Friday evening, March 20, FARC dissident groups attempted to enter Venezuelan territory and some even claimed that it was an operation by the Colombian army against Venezuelan territory. The facts show that it is false, that for a week, there had been mobilization of Venezuelan military and war material up to the border and that it had reached La Victoria. Infobae received information a few days before that there would be an attack on the FARC camp by alias Farley in Tres Esquinas.

The Bolivarian National Armed Force (FANB), with thes Special action forces (FAES), among those who were hooded, it is not known from which group, they had been in La Victoria for a week, a town on the border of the state of Apure. “Several people in the farms were alerted because officials from the General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (DGCIM) had infiltrated as street vendors and workers.”, said to Infobae a source who asked not to be identified.

AKA Ferley and its most important group he withdrew on the night of March 20 from the camp which had been bombed at dawn yesterday, but a number of his men were dispersed to various locations and attacked the Venezuelan army, several of whom were wounded, mainly because the country is littered with anti-personnel mines.

“The soldiers have lost and they are attacking civilians”, reveals one of the inhabitants of La Victoria. In the unofficial reports that have circulated, there is talk of injured and confiscated weapons, but it is not mentioned that there would have been 15 armed forces rifles which were lost during the operation on March 21.

In the media LaFrontera They announced that “the roads and paths are mined with explosives and have been activated when Venezuelan troops pass. Some vehicles were damaged while crossing the trails ”.

The group of Gentle Duarte had conversations with the ELN and other small FARC splinter groups. “There is a woman called La Catira, who comes from Caracas to San Juan de Payara to meet with the ELN, with the power to make deals, and that has upset and worried the FARC a lot.”

The excuse

A report from the Los Llanos Comprehensive Defense Region, specifically Guasdualito, with file number: K-21-0261-00059, in charge of the 53rd National Military Prosecutor, First Lieutenant Edwin Arevalo, reported the crime “Against public affairs, resistance to authority”, whose victim is “the Venezuelan state, the Bolivarian army”.

He points out that the wounded, according to Lieutenant-Colonel José Luis Villamizar, The officers of the military personnel of the flag are: Tcnel. Luis Daniel Chitty Marcano, Commander of Rural Command Detachment 355; and Captain Roberto Jesús Pérez Palma, Plaza de la 92 Brigada Caribe, Parish of Guasdualito, Apure.

Investigation? “Still to be identified” reads.

Place of events: “Rural area of ​​El Ripial, population of La Victoria, parish of Urdaneta, municipality of Páez, Apure, in the wee hours of today Sunday 03/21/2021”.

“A total of 14 people were admitted to the facilities of the San Cristóbal Military Hospital, who were injured in an alleged clash in La Victoria, Apure state,” said journalist Mayerlin Villanueva of The Táchira press.

The names of other wounded soldiers transferred to Cape Town. (Av) Guillermo Hernández Jacobsen in San Cristóbal, Táchira, are:

SM3 / Adrián Alexander Escalante Pernía.

Cap 1st. Fabricio Antonio Gómez Rangel.

Cap 1st. Francisco Javier Esqueda Sánchez.

DTG. Jesus Antonio Pérez Blanco.

DTG. Elí Armando Bernejo Hernández.

Private Vicente Eriberto Rojas Peña.

And Anthony Bento, who had a broken limb.

Although several publications speak of the death of the oldest (GNB) Contreras Chávez, belonging to the special forces commando action group, it turned out to be false and the officer denied it by voice message to some of his companions.

They tried to make the confrontation chance and in the reports they let through social networks, we talk about “Patrol work“Who was carrying out a commission” under the command of Major General Leonardo Alfredo Bello Ortega, Commander of the global defense operational zone (ZODI) n ° 31, they were surprised by subversive groups, generating a confrontation ”.

For the moment, there is a persecuted civilian population, injured and there are even several dead.

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