Businesses shut down and public transport was at a standstill Tuesday in Colombia’s Choco department, as rebels from the National Liberation Army, or ELN, launched a three-day “armed strike” that confines civilians to their homes and restricts commercial activity.
The move comes as violence worsens in several rural areas of Colombia, including the Choco region in the west, where 1,600 people have been displaced from their homes over the past two weeks, according to Colombia’s human rights ombudsman’s office.
In a statement published over the weekend, the ELN said it had decided to carry out its armed strike citing alleged “alliances between the state, the military and mercenaries” working with right-wing paramilitary groups who they claim are attacking the rebels and community leaders.
Armed strikes often involve school closures and civilians who defy the rebels' orders are threatened with execution.
Colombia’s military rejected the move on Monday and said that the ELN is trying to keep civilians off the region's roads and rivers to facilitate the transport of equipment used in illegal gold mines and to move drug shipments.
The Choco department is one of Colombia’s poorest and most sparsely populated provinces. It has few roads that connect it to the rest of the country, and is crisscrossed by dozens of rivers that serve as the main form of transportation.
But its location along Colombia’s Pacific coast has made Choco a critical region for groups that profit from the drug trade and smuggle cocaine towards Mexico. The region is also rich in gold mines that have been exploited by rebel groups.
A 2016 peace deal between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, led to the demobilization of 13,000 fighters, including hundreds of rebels in the Choco region.
But areas that were formerly controlled by the FARC have now been occupied by the ELN in Choco and other parts of Colombia. Founded in the 1960s, the ELN has an estimated 6,000 fighters in Colombia and Venezuela, and has been growing since the FARC demobilized.
In January, President Gustavo Petro cancelled peace talks with the ELN after an estimated 80 people were killed in rebel attacks in the northeastern Catatumbo region.
Colombia’s military is now fighting the ELN in both Catatumbo and Choco, where 1,500 troops were sent on Monday.
As the military takes on the ELN, a drug trafficking group known as the Gulf Clan is also making inroads in Choco, where it is fighting the rebels for territory.
“The situation is grave, but it is not incurable,” human rights ombudswoman Iris Marín Ortiz said in a video published on X on Sunday. “The armed groups are strong, but our institutions and our democracy must be stronger and more robust.”
On Monday, the U.S. embassy in Bogota issued a security alert, urging American citizens in the Choco region to leave the area “as soon as possible.”
While not a major tourist destination, Choco does have a couple of coastal towns popular for whale watching, surfing and pristine black sand beaches.
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