Retired soldier admits to murdering 120 civilians in Colombia

This is the first time that the incident in Colombia has been made public by veterans.

A general, four colonels and five officers, as well as a civilian, have surrendered before a special court set up as part of a 2016 peace deal that ended half a century of conflict between the government and the army. The government of Colombia and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebelled.

Case killing civiliansthen the victims were labeled as rebel fighters in the biggest scandal ever to rock the Colombian armed forces.

Eduvina Becerra, a relative of a murdered farmer, said: “I ask to clarify the victims, they are farmers, not insurgents, guerrillas and thugs as they have been labeled.” .

About 50 relatives of the victims were present at the university’s theater in Ocana, near Colombia’s northern border with Venezuela, where the hearings of the Special Judiciary for Peace (JEP) took place. .

The victims are usually men between the ages of 25 and 35. (Photo: Al Jazeera)

Nestor Gutierrez, a former non-commissioned officer in the Colombian army, said: “I acknowledge and accept my responsibility as a co-conspirator in the shooting deaths of civilians that took place between 2007 and 2008.

We killed innocent people, farmers,” Gutierrez said, pledging to “make this clear here before the judgment, before the world, before the country”.

In front of sobbing family members, veterans detailed how they murdered their victims, most of them men between the ages of 25 and 35.

The Colombian court said more than 6,400 civilians were murdered between 2002 and 2008 after being sent to areas far from their homes.

JEP has the authority to offer jail time alternatives to those who confess to their crimes as well as restitution.

The trial will last two days, with former General Paulino Coronado being the highest-ranking officer on trial.

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