Five police officers in Colombia were killed in two separate gunfights by left-wing, narco-terrorist members of Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or FARC, yesterday.
In Cauca province, three officers were killed and three civilians were wounded when a car bomb exploded in that south-western province. Two more cops were shot dead by suspected FARC rebels in nearby Choco province,
Colombian security forces state that they are being targeted more and more by these rebels, most likely retaliation for the killing of some of the narco-terrorist leaders.
Colombian officials said the car bomb which left three police dead in Cauca was part of an attack by FARC aimed at taking control of the village. The car bomb exploded outside Jambalo's police station, injuring a woman, a child and another civilian, as well as killing the three officers.
A police source stated that Colombian security forces are pursuing the rebels, who fled to a mountainous area. The general said he believes the killings were in retaliation for a number of operations by the security forces in the area, during which they seized tons of marijuana and cocaine.
Two police officers died in the separate in Choco province, when alleged rebels carrying long-range weapons opened fire. According to Choco governor Malcolm Ali Cordoba, two police officers were trying to stop a motorboat carrying FARC rebels.
FARC's top military commander, Jorge Briceno, a/k/a Mono Jojoy, was killed in an army bombing raid in September 2010. Colombian officials claim that getting closer to FARC leader Alfonso Cano, whose head of security was killed in March by police.
FARC, which occupies large areas in Colombia, is a hierarchical organization which, at its height during the time of the conspiracy, was comprised of 12,000 to 18,000 members. At the lowest level, the FARC is made up of 77 distinct military units, called Fronts, organized by geographical location.
These in turn are grouped into seven "blocs." FARC is led by a seven-member Secretariat and a 27-member Central General Staff, or Estado Mayor, responsible for setting the cocaine policies of FARC. FARC is responsible for the production of more than half the world’s supply of cocaine and nearly two-thirds of the cocaine imported into the United States, and is the world’s leading cocaine manufacturer.
FARC initially involved itself in the cocaine and cocaine paste trade by imposing a "tax" on individuals involved in every stage of cocaine production. Later, in the 1990s, recognizing the profit potential, FARC leadership ordered that FARC become the exclusive buyer of the raw cocaine paste used to make cocaine in all areas under FARC occupation.
In the late 1990s, the FARC leadership met and voted unanimously in favor of a number of resolutions, including resolutions to: expand coca production in areas of Colombia under FARC control; expand FARC’s international distribution routes; increase the number of crystallization labs in which cocaine paste would be converted into cocaine; appoint members within each Front to be in charge of coca production; raise prices that FARC would pay to campesinos (peasant farmers) from whom they purchased cocaine paste; and mandate that better chemicals be used to increase the quality of cocaine paste.
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