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Tensions are growing between Bogotá and Caracas after it emerged that rebels responsible for one of Colombia’s worst episodes of violence in recent years travelled through Venezuelan territory before launching the bloody wave of attacks.
At least 80 combatants armed with assault rifles and explosives passed through the Venezuelan border states of Táchira and Zulia before attacking a rival armed group and its suspected civilian supporters, according to a leaked military intelligence report.
Diplomatic tensions between the two neighbouring countries are likely to worsen because of the likelihood that the Venezuelan government of Nicolás Maduro either green-lit the operation or played an active role in planning the assault, analysts said.
“We do not have hard evidence, but it’s difficult to believe it’s a coincidence that the conflict erupted [when it did] due to the timing with the Maduro and Trump inaugurations,” said Bram Ebus, an analyst at the International Crisis Group.
The National Liberation Army (ELN) launched its attack on a rival rebel faction last Thursday as it sought to purge the lawless Catatumbo region of competitors. At least 80 have been killed and 40,000 displaced by the violence.
The Colombian president, Gustavo Petro, responded by breaking off peace negotiations with the ELN, announcing an “internal state of commotion” and deploying troops to the border.
His Venezuelan counterpart, Nicolás Maduro, also sent troops to the border.
But as the scale of the human rights atrocity became clear, tensions ratcheted up further as Petro questioned how it was possible that so many armed men could have travelled hundreds of miles from Arauca to Norte de Santander undetected.
“Surely we would have some form of information and we did not have it. Where did they walk through?” Petro asked pointedly.
Caracas has hit back accusing Petro – a former leftwing guerrilla himself – of betraying his roots.
“That man is a zombie; he has ruined all his prestige. There is nothing left of the leftwing person he once was,” a high-ranking official in the Maduro administration told the Spanish newspaper El País.
The ELN, the world’s oldest active guerrilla group, has been known to operate in Venezuelan territory for decades.
Rights groups and analysts say that, as Venezuela has collapsed into a social and political crisis that has forced 7 million of its citizens to flee, the ELN’s presence in the country has grown stronger and its bonds with the government tighter.
Initially allowed to operate in exchange for a share of profits, the rebel group has since become an extension of the Venezuelan state, experts say.
Rights groups say that Venezuelan forces have worked with the ELN on several occasions in recent years to eradicate rival guerrilla groups.
The ELN is also reportedly used by Maduro to control the flow of people and goods across the border region and enforce order in a region known as the mining arc, where the rebels exploit rich deposits of gold, diamonds and coltan.
“It’s not just that the government is turning a blind eye. They are partners,” says Cristina Burelli, founder of SOS Orinoco, an environmental advocacy group.
Maduro’s ties to the ELN have long been an open and uncomfortable secret but the humanitarian catastrophe in Catatumbo has cast a spotlight on Maduro’s relationship with the rebel group and put pressure on Petro to take action.
“What Venezuela is doing is making a mockery of Colombia and we are allowing it,” retired military general Gustavo Matamoros Camacho told local radio on Thursday.
Petro was one of Maduro’s few remaining allies but refused to attend his inauguration on 10 January after Venezuela’s national elections were widely deemed a sham.
“Petro is trying to be delicate, but for Maduro, this is an affront. It means war to him,” Burelli said, “Two weeks after his inauguration, and all hell breaks loose? The timing is too close.”
Maduro denies that Venezuela is a safe haven for the ELN and has hit back at Colombia, accusing it of hosting the Venezuelan crime syndicate Tren de Aragua.
Petro must now walk the tightrope of managing the security threat at the border and Venezuela’s alleged involvement in it while avoiding further antagonising Caracas.
Petro said on Thursday that he was in dialogue with its neighbours and has asked “the person who runs the presidency in Venezuela” to block illegal border crossings.
Colombia’s foreign minister Luis Murillo requested while at the UN in New York on Wednesday that Venezuela take better control of the border.
“De-escalation is definitely what is needed now,” Ebus said. “The big fear is that Catatumbo could spiral and the ELN could try to take the whole border region.”
