Colombia’s ELN guerrillas place communities in lockdown citing Trump ‘intervention’ threats

In this Oct. 29, 2006, photo, Antonio Garcia, leader of the National Liberation Army (ELN), looks at his rebel group's flag during a press conference at the Palco hotel in Havana. (AP photo/ Javier Galeano)

Colombia’s ELN guerrilla group on Friday ordered civilians in areas under its control to stay home for three days as it carries out military exercises in response to “intervention” threats from U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump said earlier this month any country that produces cocaine and sells it to the United States was “subject to attack.”

The ELN, the oldest surviving guerrilla group in the Americas, controls key drug-producing regions of Colombia and vowed Friday to fight for the country’s “defence” in the face of Trump’s “threats of imperialist intervention.”

It urged civilians in areas it controls to stay indoors for 72 hours starting at 6:00 am on Sunday, avoiding main roads and navigable rivers.

“It is necessary for civilians not to mix with fighters to avoid accidents,” the group said in a statement.

Colombian Defence Minister Pedro Sanchez dismissed the ELN move as “nothing more than criminal coercion” and vowed the military “will be everywhere -- in every mountain, every jungle, every river” to counter its threat.

With a force of about 5,800 combatants, the ELN -- the Spanish acronym for National Liberation Army -- is present in over a fifth of Colombia’s 1,100-plus municipalities, according to the Insight Crime research center.

The ELN has taken part in failed peace negotiations with Colombia’s last five governments.

While professing to be driven by leftist, nationalist ideology, the ELN is deeply involved in the drug trade and has become one of the region’s most powerful organized crime groups.

It vies for territory and control of lucrative coca plantations and trafficking routes with dissident fighters that refused to lay down arms when the FARC guerrilla army disarmed under a 2016 peace deal.

One ELN stronghold is the Catatumbo region near the Venezuelan border -- one of the areas with the most coca crops in the world.

Several studies have pointed to an ELN presence across the border, where it allegedly operates in alliance with Venezuela’s armed forces, though President Nicolas Maduro denies this.

The ELN launched an offensive in Catatumbo in January, sparking a conflict with FARC dissidents that led to more than 100 deaths.

It was the bloodiest incident since President Gustavo Petro took office in August 2022.

Colombia is the world’s top cocaine producer, according to the UN.

Souring ties

Relations between Bogota and Washington, historically strong, have soured under Petro, Colombia’s first-ever leftist president.

Petro has openly clashed with Trump, calling him “rude and ignorant” and comparing him to Adolf Hitler.

The Colombian leader denounced the Trump administration’s treatment of migrants and what he has termed the “extrajudicial executions” of nearly 90 people in strikes on boats in the Caribbean and Pacific the U.S. claims, without providing evidence, were ferrying drugs.

Petro has also criticized Washington’s military deployment within striking distance of Venezuela, where Maduro fears he is the target of a regime-change plot under the guise of an anti-drug operation.

Washington, in turn, has accused Petro of drug trafficking and imposed sanctions.

Trump removed Bogota from a list of allies in the fight against narco trafficking, but the country has so far escaped harsher punishment -- possibly as Washington awaits the right’s likely return in 2026 elections.