Four military personnel are killed in Colombia after the capture of a drug dealer

Four soldiers died this Sunday (7) in an ambush in northwestern Colombia, according to the army, which attributed the attack to the Gulf Clan, the largest gang in the country.

“With deep pain, I inform you that a captain, corporal and two soldiers from our army who protected the community of Santa Lucía, in Ituango, were cowardly murdered in an ambush carried out by criminals of the Gulf Clan”, in the department of Antioquia, General Juvenal Díaz, commander of the army in the region, wrote on Twitter.

The military were victims of gunfire and grenades thrown from homes, the general said in a video later released to the press.

Colombian President Iván Duque also spoke in a Twitter message condemning the attack and saying he asked the army to find those responsible.

The attack is the third to occur in the past two weeks, when seven soldiers and one civilian were killed.

All the killings took place in the department of Antioquia, one of Otoniel’s strongholds, as Dairo Antonio Úsuga is known, the country’s most wanted drug trafficker and leader of the Gulf Clan, who was captured by the Colombian government in late October.

Authorities interpreted the attacks of recent weeks as retaliation for the arrest.

The government expects Otoniel to be extradited in the coming weeks to the United States, where he will face trial in Miami and New York for drug trafficking.

After four decades of fighting drug trafficking, Colombia remains the world’s leading producer of cocaine and the United States the largest consumer of the drug.

Otoniel, 50, was captured during Operation Osiris in Necoclí, near the Panamanian border. About 500 soldiers, supported by 22 helicopters, participated in the operation.

The Gulf Clan leader is accused of sending dozens of batches of cocaine to the US, in addition to murdering police officers, recruiting minors and sexually abusing children, among other crimes, according to statements by the Colombian president.

Financed mainly by drug trafficking, illegal mining and extortion, the group is identified by the government as one of those responsible for the wave of violence in the country, the worst since the signing of the peace agreement with the FARC, in 2016.