The government of Colombia announced, in a congressional appearance by Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez, that the state is focusing on fighting domestic criminal groups, following the declaration of Venezuela’s Cartel de los Soles as a “terrorist organization,” thanks to the conservative majority in the chamber.
After recent doubts raised by President Gustavo Petro, who questioned the real existence of this organization — which the United States directly links to drug trafficking activities led by the Venezuelan government — the clash between the government and Congress highlights differences between the executive and legislative over how to focus the fight against drug trafficking groups operating in Colombia.
While the echoes of U.S. decertification, confirmed this week, imply a reorganization of the anti-narcotics fight, questions remain over whether the Petro administration will move closer to U.S. positions. For now, such a shift seems as distant as it was before the decertification.
Colombia focuses on domestic groups as Congress labels Cartel de los Soles a terrorist organization
The conservative majority in Colombia’s Congress managed to pass a proposal by Senator Jota Pe Hernandez to declare the Cartel de los Soles a terrorist organization in Colombia.
The resolution was ultimately approved, aligning the South American country with the U.S.-led stance aimed at discrediting the Venezuelan government over alleged drug trafficking ties.
For years, the United States and some Venezuelan dissidents have claimed that the government of Nicols Maduro — through Diosdado Cabello first and later the president himself — has directed this alleged criminal entity engaged in drug trafficking.
However, recent statements by the Colombian president questioned the actual existence of this organization, suggesting it may be more of a U.S. justification for acting against Maduro’s government.
The reality today, after U.S. decertification, is that Colombia faces its own internal struggle between government and Congress — two powers now openly at odds — over how to go forward on the fight against drug trafficking groups.
In his congressional appearance, Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez — facing a no-confidence motion seeking to force him out of office — insisted that Colombia will continue focusing its anti-narcotics efforts on domestic groups.
“Those groups include: the Gulf Clan, the ELN cartel, and the cartel of [FARC] dissidents in all its variations. Our focus is on those threats,” the minister said.
Shortly before, in an interview with local magazine Semana, Pedro Sanchez explained the state’s methodology for identifying and prioritizing threats from criminal organizations. “We determine the criminal and terrorist threat based on a document called analysis of the critical capabilities of the threat. Basically, that document establishes three major groups that fracture among themselves because their interest is drugs, ambition, and not ideology,” the minister told the outlet.
Colombia, divided between the Narco Board and Cartel de los Soles
Regarding the Cartel de los Soles, a few weeks ago President Petro said this organization “does not exist, it is the fictitious excuse of the far right to topple governments that do not obey them. The transit of Colombian cocaine through Venezuela is controlled by the Narco Board, and its bosses live in Europe and the Middle East. I proposed to the U.S. and Venezuela that we destroy that cartel together. It’s about coordination, not submission.”
With this, the president brought to the center of the debate the importance of a coalition of domestic groups — the Gulf Clan, FARC dissidents of the Second Marquetalia, and the group led by alias Ivan Mordisco — in controlling drug trafficking.
In fact, shortly afterward, Gustavo Petro called for this Narco Board to be declared a terrorist organization, just as Congress has now done with the Cartel de los Soles.
“Terrorism is the new expression of the factions claiming to be led by ‘Ivan Mordisco’ and that have subordinated themselves to the Narco Board, which operates internationally as a confederation of mafias,” Petro stated in a public appearance in the Caribbean a month ago.
While the Defense minister maintains that anti-narcotics priorities are set based on intelligence reports and institutional analyses identifying capacities, resources, and modes of operation, the opposition-controlled Congress is pushing to prioritize the fight against the Cartel de los Soles, which Petro argues does not even exist as a drug-trafficking organization — beyond possible ties to internal corruption in the Venezuelan government.
A new element of political polarization in Colombia
The fact is that, as all this unfolds, the anti-narcotics fight enters a new chapter in Colombia’s political polarization ahead of next year’s elections. While the Petro administration insists on focusing efforts against domestic groups organized under the so-called Narco Board, the conservative opposition is aligning with the U.S. and seeking to bring the Cartel de los Soles into the battle.
Meanwhile, Congress’s no-confidence motion against Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez continues. The opposition accuses the still-sitting minister of allowing an increase in coca cultivation after the government prioritized cracking down on drug-trafficking gangs over coca growers.
This is precisely one of the U.S. arguments for decertifying Colombia, beyond the political differences and constant disputes between the two governments, which nevertheless have not completely ruled out finding common ground, since both recognize the power of drug-trafficking mafias, whether led by domestic or foreign players.