AUC News
Los Caparrapos
Los Caparrapos, also known as the Virgilio Peralta Arenas Front, is a criminal group linked to drug trafficking, with a strong presence in Colombia’s Antioquia and Córdoba departments. Previously allied to Los Urabeños, the criminal group started a dispute with its former partners for the control of criminal profits from drug trafficking and gold mining in these...
AUC Profile
AUC
The United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia - AUC) was a coalition of right-wing death squads that used the conflict to camouflage their illicit economic activities. These included drug trafficking, displacement, kidnapping, and extortion. The AUC once operated in two-thirds of the country with approximately 30,000...
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Analysis /
Colombia Braces for Impact of Returning Drug Traffickers and Paramilitaries
The release of Colombian underworld boss "Perra loca" from a US prison is adding to fears that a flood of recently freed drug lords and paramilitaries could have a...
Colombia’s Mirror: War and Drug Trafficking in the Prison System
Colombia's prisons are a reflection of the multiple conflicts that have plagued the country for the last half-century. Paramilitaries, guerrillas and drug...
Brief /
Intl Court Condemns Colombia for Bloody 2002 Military Operation
An international court's condemnation of the Colombian state's role in an infamous military operation in the city of Medellín speaks to the failings of...
Analysis /
How Rejected FARC Peace Deal Compares to Earlier Paramilitary Pact
Following the narrow victory by those who opposed the peace deal between Colombia's government and the FARC rebel group, InSight Crime considers how it compares to...
Colombia Elites and Organized Crime: ‘Don Berna’
By the end of 1993, Pablo Escobar was cornered. The cocaine king -- known as "El Patrón" -- was running out of money and options. His top assassins were either...
Colombia Elites and Organized Crime: ‘Jorge 40’
Rodrigo Tovar Pupo never imagined it would come to this: dressed in an orange jumpsuit in a Washington DC courtroom and standing in front of a United States federal...
Analysis /
Court Ruling Stirs Controversy Over Colombia’s ‘Para-Economy’
A recent ruling by Colombia’s Justice and Peace Court that mentioned Postobón called for employees of the iconic soft drink company to be investigated for...
Brief /
Colombia Seeks Probe Into Beverage Giant’s Alleged Paramilitary Links
A Colombian court is seeking to renew investigations into allegations the country's iconic beverage company Postobón colluded with paramilitary death squads,...
Brief /
Colombia Investigates Over 100 Disappearances from Bogotá Prison
Prosecutors in Colombia believe over 100 people were murdered, dismembered and disappeared in a Bogotá prison between 1999 and 2001, in a macabre example of how...
