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News > Latin America

Colombia: 8 Police Officers Killed in Explosives Attack

  • Riot police secures parameter during a nationwide strike against the government's education, labor and health policies in Bogota, Colombia March 17, 2016.

    Riot police secures parameter during a nationwide strike against the government's education, labor and health policies in Bogota, Colombia March 17, 2016. | Photo: Reuters

Published 11 April 2018
Opinion

The incident took place in El Tomate, in the municipality of San Pedro de Urabá in Antioquia, Colombia.

A group of unknown men attacked police officers in Colombia with explosives causing the death of eight members of the security forces. The incident took place in El Tomate, in the municipality of San Pedro de Urabá in Antioquia, Colombia.

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Exclusive: A Look into 'Clan del Golfo,' Colombia's Largest Paramilitary Group

The attack against the patrol occurred in the rural area of the municipality of San Pedro de Urabá, in the department of Antioquia. The agents participated in a process to return land to peasants displaced by the internal conflict of more than half a century that has claimed 220,000 lives.

Although it is not yet confirmed who is responsible for the attack, security forces speculate that the crimnial group Clan de Golfo or 'Gulf Clan' was behind the attack.

The Gulf Clan has control across all Colombian territory and funds its activities with drug trafficking, illegal mining and extortion, thanks to money-laundering in sectors like real estate business and international franchises.

The organization emerged in 2007, as a result of the 2005 demobilization of paramilitary groups then known as the United Self-Defenses Forces of Colombia, leaving a void in the drug trafficking and extortion business. The group is also known as "Los Urabeños," a nickname given by the Colombian government.

The group is known to have at least 3,000 fighters including permanent members and occasional mercenaries.

Cocaine trafficking being their main source of revenue, the clan's area of influence includes most Colombian ports and its members reportedly charge drug dealers and producers for each kilogram of cocaine departing from their areas of control.

Besides its local alliances with criminal organizations and gangs, the Gulf Clan has extended its network and is in good business relations with drug cartels in Costa Rica, Honduras, Panama, Guatemala and Mexico, including the infamous Sinaloa Cartel, whose head Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is on trial in the United States, according to the report.

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