Colombian Defense Minister Says ELN Rebels Responsible For Terrorist Attack In Bogota

The Colombian government blames Thursday's terrorist attack on a police academy in the country's capital on the National Liberation Army (ELN) rebel group, Colombian Defense Minister Guillermo Botero said Friday

MEXICO CITY (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th January, 2019) The Colombian government blames Thursday's terrorist attack on a police academy in the country's capital on the National Liberation Army (ELN) rebel group, Colombian Defense Minister Guillermo Botero said Friday.

On Thursday, a bomb-laden car broke through a checkpoint near the police academy building and exploded on its premises. According to the latest data, 21 people were killed and nearly 70 others injured in the incident. Colombian President Ivan Duque announced a three-day mourning period in light of the deadly attack.

"Those lives were claimed by the National Liberation Army's terrorist attack," Botero said at a press conference in Bogota.

He added that the Colombian authorities had identified the perpetrator as 56-year-old Jose Aldemar Rojas Rodriguez, who was thought to have direct links to the ELN, and specified that he died in the incident.

Colombian Attorney General Nestor Humberto Martinez, in turn, named Colombian citizen Ricardo Carvajal, who was detained shortly after the attack, as a second plotter.

"Carvajal will be charged with murder and terrorism," Martinez indicated.

The ELN, a group that follows communist ideology and believed to have around 1,500 fighters, has been engaged in an armed struggle with Colombian authorities with the aim of overthrowing it since 1964. After the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia disarmed itself in 2017, the ELN became the country's only guerrilla movement. In February 2017, the armed group started peace talks with the Colombian government, which have yet to yield concrete results.