Colombia issues arrest warrants for rebel group members for Miguel Uribe killing

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Colombia’s attorney general on Tuesday said her office had obtained arrest warrants for seven members of a rebel group known as Segunda Marquetalia for the killing of Miguel Uribe, a conservative presidential hopeful who was shot in the head during a rally in Bogota in June 2025.

In a statement, Attorney General Luz Adriana Camargo said that Uribe’s killing last year was “the result of a structured criminal operation that involved an urban criminal gang that was hired” by Segunda Marquetalia to kill the senator.

The attorney general said that Uribe’s killing was planned by Kendry Téllez, a member of Segunda Marquetalia who had previously fought for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the guerrilla group that signed a peace deal with Colombia’s government in 2016.

Luciano Marín, a former FARC Commander who abandoned the peace deal and founded the Segunda Marquetalia group in 2018, was also charged with helping to plan the killing, which was carried out by a teenager hired by a gang in Bogota.

Marín, who is more commonly known as Iván Márquez, was last seen in public in 2024, when Segunda Marquetalia and the administration of Colombian President Gustavo Petro launched peace talks.

The negotiations between Marín and the Colombian government were suspended at the end of 2024, following a schism within Segunda Marquetalia.

Prosecutors in Colombia had long hinted that the rebel group was involved in Uribe’s murder.

On Tuesday, officials announced a reward of $1.3 million for information leading to Marín's capture, as well as smaller rewards for information leading to the capture of the other six members of Segunda Marquetalia who were charged with murder.

Uribe was speaking in a park in Bogota, on June 7, 2025 when he was shot several times by a teenager, who fled the scene but was quickly captured by Uribe's bodyguards.

Uribe died two months later from his injuries.

Uribe’s killing marked a low point in Petro’s efforts to reduce crime in Colombia, where drug traffickers and rebel groups are fighting for control of territory abandoned by the FARC following the 2016 peace deal.

The attack on Uribe, a conservative who had promised to take a tougher stance against rebel groups, was the first assassination of a presidential candidate in Colombia in three decades.

Colombia will hold presidential elections in May. If none of the candidates gets more than 50% of the vote, a runoff will be held in June between the top two contenders.

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