The defense minister says that the soldiers taken while evacuating the area after a military operation that killed 11 rebels.
At least 34 government soldiers have been kidnapped by armed civilians in a jungle in southeastern Colombia after clashes that killed 11 combatants, including a commander of a dissident faction of the former FARC rebel group, says Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez.
The fight occurred on Sunday in a rural part of the municipality of El Retico in the province of Guaviare and involved members of the Central General Staff (EMC), a group of former combatants with the FARC on the left, or revolutionary armed forces of Colombia, which rejected a 2016 peace agreement with the Government.
Sanchez said Tuesday that the soldiers were taken while evacuating the area after a military operation that killed an EMC commander and another 10 rebels.
“This is an illegal criminal action of people with civil clothing,” Sanchez told reporters. “This is a kidnapping.”
The Jungle region is considered a strategic corridor for drug trafficking and is known for its extensive coca crops, the main ingredient used to produce cocaine.
It followed a similar kidnapping in June when the army said that 57 soldiers were seized by civilians in a mountainous area of the Southwest, a key area for cocaine production and one of the most tense in the ongoing security crisis of the country.
The Colombian army has maintained that civilians in the region receive orders from EMC, the main FARC dissident group.
Armed groups, which are financed through drug trafficking, illegal mining and other crimes, remain present in Colombia after a six decades conflict that has killed more than 450,000 people despite the peace agreement with the FARC nine years ago when it was the largest rebel group in Colombia.
Last week, at least 18 people died and dozens injured in two attacks attributed to FARC dissident factions.
In Cali, the third most populated city in the country, a vehicle full of explosives detonated on Thursday near a military aviation school, killing six people and wounding 71, according to the mayor's office.
Hours before, a drone in the municipality of Amalfi in the department of Antioquia fell a Hawk National Police helicopter that participated in a coca crop eradication operation in the municipality of Amalfi in the department of Antioquia, killing 12 police officers.
President Gustavo Petro blamed the attacks on FARC dissident factions.
