Colombia not only lost control of the border it shares with Venezuela, but is now preparing for a political and judicial confrontation with Peru over control of Santa Rosa Island. The Petro administration also neglected the country's second most important border zone, the Ecuadorian border, which is now in the hands of a sinister criminal alliance that threatens national sovereignty.
In the last two years, drug traffickers and guerrillas have taken over 586 kilometers and hold the keys to the gateway into and out of Ecuador, according to a dozen intelligence reports and judicial investigations from both nations revealed by SEMANA.
The military forces acknowledged to this magazine, from Quito and Bogotá, that their soldiers lack command in the region, and a journalistic team that spent several days in the territory confirmed that the armies had been replaced by a powerful mafia that put a price on the states."They have bought everything they wanted. They have the money to pay prosecutors, judges, uniformed personnel, and politicians. They wander around here and there, but we don't have the capacity to control them," explained a high-ranking Ecuadorian official, who counterbalances the advance of criminals across the international border.
The money has been enough to build bridges and roads in the jungle to transport cocaine harvested in the mountains of Nariño, Cauca, Caquetá, and Putumayo, some of the main sources of the illicit substance inhaled by thousands of people in Latin America, the United States, Europe, and Asia.
Authorities have detected 185 clandestine crossings guarded by men with rifles and shotguns, whose routes are also used to smuggle in most of the weapons that keep the war going in Colombia. Hundreds of explosives also enter through these routes, which pierce the earth and allow the illegal extraction of precious metals, which are the financial muscle of the Gulf Clan.
While illegal groups have millions of dollars at their disposal to commit crimes and machines to produce hundreds of counterfeit bills that enter the national market, authorities lack sufficient resources to confront them.
The Army's 23rd Brigade, which is tasked with upholding sovereignty in the Nariño region, has seen its 2025 budget cut by nearly 21 percent (only 77 million pesos), while the 27th Brigade, which carries out the same task in Putumayo, received no funds in 2024 and was allocated 46 million pesos this year, according to Ministry of Defense data. SEMANA inquired with the institution to understand the reasons for this drastic cut, but received no response.
The police are experiencing the same tragedy. A senior official in the region revealed that, although there has been an increase in the number of uniformed officers and the various specialties are doing everything possible to meet their objectives, the operational lag puts them at a disadvantage against their enemies:"We don't have the capacity to control illegal crossings. There are few resources in technology, investigation, and intelligence. For example, when studying a case, we find no security cameras. Added to this is the difficult task with the community, which doesn't report or provide information due to the fear instilled by the criminals." A Failed Peace
Ecuadorian authorities are aware that security in Colombia has been conditioned by the peace talks held by the Casa de Nariño with criminal groups, and the repercussions have been felt in their country."We called our Colombian colleagues and they told us they couldn't operate because of fire restrictions; we couldn't conduct mirror operations; the government in Bogotá wouldn't let them," said an Ecuadorian Army colonel with astonishment, who emphasized that after the series of breakdowns in those peace talks, they resumed offensive maneuvers and have been able to strike several blows along the border.
The Office of the High Commissioner for Peace has approached all criminals who operate in the border area with Ecuador and has been unsuccessful with none, according to evidence gathered by Ecuadorian and Colombian intelligence units.
On the one hand, talks with the FARC's Central General Staff, led by alias Iván Mordisco, who operates in Tumaco and Barbacoas through the Oliver Sinisterra front, failed. This group maintains ties to cartels in Mexico, Albania, and Ecuador for the sale of cocaine, for which they receive payments in cash, in contraband products to give their operations a semblance of legality, and in weapons or drones that they then use to attack entire communities, as well as police and military personnel.
On the other hand, the National Coordinator of the Bolivarian Army, with Iván Ríos' faction, a dissident of the Second Marquetalia, continues to wield weapons and control territories in both countries to increase its income, working with European and Mexican drug lords, mainly in Ricaurte."They are in charge of producing cocaine and have sufficient connections to send it to Ecuadorian ports, which then sail in submarines," a Colombian officer told SEMANA. In turn, the Border Commandos, who also distanced themselves from alias Iván Márquez, continue to murder and produce cocaine from Putumayo and Ipiales."They use indigenous communities to grow coca and transport it through their reservations to the border, where the Ecuadorian cartels receive the shipment. This limits our operations and they say it's something ancestral, when it's quite the opposite. They protest and blockade us when we affect them, and these communities ask the guerrillas to defend them from the authorities since they are being extorted," the same source explained, under condition of anonymity.
The Comuneros del Sur, a dissident group of the ELN, whose peace process is advancing with the delivery of weapons and is described as a “success” to this day, is reportedly a farce, according to the findings of troops in Cumbal, Mallama and Santa Cruz, on the Colombian side.
Wiretaps, testimonies, and raids in both countries show that the Comuneros del Sur have established a parallel criminal group to continue supporting their illicit economies while negotiating with the Petro government."They changed their name and uniforms. Now they present themselves as the United Self-Defense Forces of Nariño and dress in black. They have not been recognized as an organized armed group, but they meet all the characteristics of one," a high-ranking military commander in Colombia said confidentially. Ecuador has the same information and has already changed their identity in its intelligence documents."Now they are the Self-Defense Forces, and we are fighting them because they commit many crimes in the area," a commander in that country told SEMANA.
Without the Comuneros' brand, the criminals recruit men and women under false pretenses in exchange for a monthly salary of $500 (about 2 million pesos). One of them admitted the plan to authorities after being arrested:"What they say is that we have to eradicate the vicious gangs, the thieves, and other groups in the area, collect protection money, and more. They paid me the first month and then didn't give me anything else. I escaped, and now I'm afraid." Intelligence units have detected that this group is made up of more than 180 people moving between Colombia and Ecuador. Its founding occurred less than six months ago, when the process with the Petro government took off. A criminal autopsy
General Fausto Salinas, former commander-in-chief of the Ecuadorian police, told SEMANA that, by 2024, the institution he led estimated that of the 1,500 tons of cocaine that Colombia could produce each year, nearly 900 would have passed through Ecuador to be shipped to various destinations around the world from the ports of its coastal provinces.
"Without a doubt, the border is one of the most critical points in Ecuador because there is a cocaine production in Colombia that tries to reach international markets, and Ecuador becomes a transit center. The border is extensive and extremely complex, which makes it difficult to achieve complete coverage."
Salinas stated that Nariño is the Colombian department that transports the most cocaine production to his country, according to intelligence studies he directed at the time. Analyzing the results of the Petro administration's anti-drug policy in that territory, this magazine established that the Ministry of Defense, through its forces, has not eradicated a single hectare of illicit crops in 2025 due to a court order, and in 2024, it was 23 hectares, when the UN projects the existence of 30,000 hectares full of coca leaves.
In that area, the destruction of infrastructure for the production of illicit drugs has also fallen by 35 percent. Seizures of coca leaves decreased by 11 percent and coca base seizures contracted by 9 percent, according to data from the Ministry of Defense.
On the other hand, the Ecuadorian Army responded to SEMANA that Colombian guerrilla groups are controlling the illegal extraction of mining deposits in their country, generating a historic environmental crisis and putting hundreds of indigenous and peasant lives at risk: “For a kilo of gold that they put on the market, they have 100,000 dollars (more than 400 million pesos), and the extraction happens all the time.”
The spotlight is on the Comuneros del Sur, now presenting themselves as the United Self-Defense Forces of Nariño, and the Second Marquetalia factions, which divided up the land to operate under a truce with the Choneros and the Lobos, Ecuador's main criminal organizations.
An intelligence report from Ecuador to which this magazine had access illustrates that Colombian guerrillas are responsible for drilling the earth in that country, extracting the gold-bearing material and transporting it by pulley, by air, to Colombian soil to continue its production.
"They materialize the gold in Colombia because they know that in Ecuador, the Armed Forces have the ability to seize all their elements and destroy their machinery without hesitation. They know that in Colombia there are fewer limitations on operations and they are aware of that," said an officer from that state. This version was confirmed by the Colombian Military Forces:"We hear them say that here we do respect human rights, so they come to produce illegal gold."
The evidence shows that these activities are concentrated in municipalities of Nariño. The operational results in the fight against illegal mining contrast with the complexity of the evidence and raise alarm bells. So far this year, only eight arrests have been made on the border due to this phenomenon, the same number as in 2024; And only 17 illegal mining production units have been seized in 2025, compared to ten last year, according to figures submitted by the Ministry of Defense, which quantifies the operations of all Colombian forces. The results, evidently, are poor.
For former President Iván Duque, the presence of illegal actors and foreign mafias in that corner of the country has significantly increased compared to when he handed it over in August 2022. He asserted that the state has lost its strength due to the decisions made by President Gustavo Petro.
"The entire offensive capacity has been structurally weakened, and recovering what we had before is very difficult. Added to this is the permissiveness that has been shown with illicit crops. And total peace, which is a fatal peace, weakens the structure of the State, serving the interests of criminals," he said.
Diego Molano, former Minister of Defense, indicated that these crimes are accompanied by a state-sponsored coercion of vulnerable populations, a situation that has worsened in the last two years, according to the former official."Armed groups have taken over indigenous territories, where no activity can be carried out. Colombian organizations have been gaining ground on the border and have clashed for power. There are not only Colombian structures, there are also Mexican ones," he stated.
The Power of RumichacaIn addition to the Jalisco Nueva Generación cartel and the Sinaloa cartel, which coordinate the international relations of Colombian guerrillas and Ecuadorian structures, SEMANA has established that there is also the presence of the Tren de Aragua, whose tentacles extend from Venezuela. An investigation by the Colombian Military Forces proved that this criminal organization took control of the Rumichaca bridge, the legal crossing where hundreds of people circulate daily under the apparent surveillance of the States.
Based on the evidence, it was learned that the Aragua Train"was responsible for drug trafficking in that area, collecting taxes from all sectors of the economy, migrant trafficking to the United States, homicides, and currency exchange."
To do so, he managed to penetrate the security forces:"Colombian police officers are offered economic benefits; it can be a fixed or sporadic fee. The money is given to them to alert them of the forces' movements, to avoid their duties, or to affect their opposing factions with operations," acknowledged a source within the institution. Faced with this, there are several internal investigations underway, and several uniformed officers have been deprived of their liberty. This bridge is also witness to a practice that has the region concerned:"the swap." Boxes of ketamines leave Ecuador for the border and are delivered to recipients who bring them into Colombia in exchange for cocaine shipments."They exchange cocaine for ketamines, which are used to make synthetic drugs in cities like Cali, Medellín, and Bogotá. That's the swap, and it happens on the border," stated the Colombian police.
Just a few meters away, dollar factories have been identified, owned by guerrillas and used by Ecuadorian cartels to infiltrate the nation's economy, mixing them with profits from cocaine, gold, smuggling, and extortion.
In addition to these practices, intimidation of the civilian population is a daily occurrence. The guerrillas torment Colombians and Ecuadorians to force them to part with their money and work for them. The situation is dramatic.
“They impose a tax of 200 pesos on each liter of milk. They charge miners $300 to work at the mine entrances. They threaten local leaders. They force indigenous people to exercise control and impose their rules; if they don't, they kill them, as has happened in the territory,” one of the region's leaders told SEMANA, on condition of anonymity, for fear of being identified by the illegal organizations.
What's behind it?
According to Colombian justice investigations, the main perpetrators of the lack of control on the border are Duverney Valencia Forero, alias Gerson (Central General Staff); Wilson de Jesús Londoño Cano, alias Uriel (Segunda Marquetalia); Giovanni Andrés Rojas, alias Araña (Border Commands), and Gabriel Yepes Mejía, alias H. H. (Southern Comuneros/United Self-Defense Forces of Nariño).
Former prosecutor Néstor Humberto Martínez explained that this is not the first time that Colombian criminal groups have had influence in Ecuador, and the motivation is that it is more profitable for them to send cocaine through that country than through Colombian territory: “The departure of the speedboats is much more beneficial from Ecuador than from the Colombian Pacific coast for two reasons. The first is because of state surveillance. The second is because in Ecuador there is a gasoline subsidy for artisanal fishing, and that means that, unusually, gasoline is used to transport coca paste. This has required regulation.”
For him, “since the new government, of the Historic Pact, operations have not been carried out in that area as in the times of Uribe, Santos, and Duque. That was left to the law of crime and criminality.” And he raised the possibility that President Daniel Noboa, through international resources, could access the computers seized from Raúl Reyes in 2008, a former FARC commander killed in that country, to learn the unresolved truths and achieve justice.
For General Salinas, former commander of the Ecuadorian Police, the logistical advantages his country offers are also a reason criminals use to smuggle cocaine:"Here the routes are shorter, compared to Colombia, so they've taken advantage of that. What needs to be made clear is that in Ecuador we don't have any forbidden areas; the Armed Forces reach every corner."
Just as a conflict with Peru over Santa Rosa Island has just erupted, it's become clear that Colombia is facing an unprecedented security crisis in its border areas.
On the Venezuelan side, the ELN guerrilla group, under the approval of Nicolás Maduro's regime, has absolute control and subjugates the civilian population. In Panama, the Gulf Clan has taken over the Darién jungle and acts as the authority monitoring the flow of migrants and the exodus of cocaine into Central America. In the Amazon, the FARC dissidents of Mordisco have taken over the exodus of drugs into Brazil. In Nicaragua, criminal gangs coordinate the exodus of drugs and the passage of irregular migrants through San Andrés. Over the past two years, the country has regressed years in terms of border control, while the Petro government spoke of total peace. Transnational criminal gangs operate freely, unhindered.
