The ELN is conducting military drills and ordering civilians to shelter in place as President Trump warns drug-producing countries face potential attacks.
Colombia’s largest remaining rebel group has told civilians living under its authority to remain in their homes for three days while it conducts military training to counter the growing threat from the United States.
The left-wing rebel National Liberation Army (ELN) ordered a blockade on Friday and told residents to stay away from major roads and rivers starting Sunday morning as its fighters carried out what the group described as preparations to protect the country from “imperialist intervention.”
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The announcement follows a warning from President Donald Trump that countries producing and exporting cocaine to the United States could be exposed to military or ground attacks.
“To avoid accidents, it is necessary that civilians do not mix with combatants,” the ELN said.
Colombian Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez rejected the rebels’ directive as “nothing but criminal coercion” and pledged that government forces would maintain a presence “in every mountain, in every jungle, in every river.”
The move underscores the deepening tensions between Washington and Bogotá, as President Trump escalates his comments against Colombian President Gustavo Petro.
Earlier this week, President Trump told business executives that the Petro “gets smarter, or it’s the next Petro,” cited cocaine production as justification for possible action and hinted at a U.S. military buildup near Venezuela amid threats to remove President Nicolas Maduro.
In recent days, the Trump administration has imposed new sanctions on Venezuela, targeting three nephews of Nicolas Maduro’s first lady, Syria Flores, as well as the oil tanker and six shipping companies connected to it, as the United States ramps up pressure on Caracas following the U.S. seizure of a Venezuelan oil tanker.
Petro has responded to President Trump’s actions, including sanctions against the Colombian president, with a similar defiant stance, warning Trump earlier this month to “wake up the jaguar” and insisting that any attack on Colombian territory would be tantamount to a declaration of war.
The left-wing president claimed his administration was destroying a drug facility every 40 minutes and invited the president of the United States to witness the destruction of the lab firsthand. In late November, the government hailed it as the largest cocaine bust in a decade.
The rebel group ELN, which has about 5,800 fighters, maintains control of key drug-producing areas, including the Catatumbo region along the Venezuelan border.
Al Jazeera correspondent Teresa Bo, who visited ELN-held territory in November, found the group wielding unwavering authority, with fighters openly holding banners declaring “full peace is a failure” and no government soldiers in sight.
A senior official interviewed during that trip, General Ricardo, suggested that if President Trump were to attack Venezuela, the rebels could join a broader resistance. He warned that such an intervention could provoke an armed response across Latin America, and said the U.S. action was a violation of regional self-determination.
The organization has attempted to negotiate peace with five previous Colombian governments without success.
Talks with Petro’s government broke down after the ELN launched an attack in Catatumbo in January, killing more than 100 people and forcing thousands to flee their homes.
Despite claiming ideological motivations, the group derives significant income from drug trafficking and competes for control of coca-growing areas and smuggling corridors with former FARC fighters who have refused to disarm under a 2016 peace deal.
Relations between Colombia and the United States have sharply deteriorated since President Trump returned to office.
The U.S. government imposed personal sanctions on Petro, canceled his visa after he participated in pro-Palestinian protests in New York, and removed Colombia from its list of trusted counternarcotics partners.
Meanwhile, President Trump has sent the nation’s largest aircraft carrier and about 15,000 troops to the Caribbean, and has ordered more than 20 military strikes in recent months against suspected drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean and off the Pacific coast of Central and South America, killing more than 80 people.
Human rights groups, some U.S. Democratic politicians, and Latin American countries condemned the attack as an unlawful and extrajudicial killing of civilians.
