National Army seizes more than 32,500 gallons of cocaine in production in Nariño

The Command Against Drug Trafficking and Transnational Threats (CONAT), in a joint operation with the Colombian Aerospace Force—coordinated with the National Police’s Criminal Investigation Directorate (Dijín) and Interpol— and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), has in recent hours located a coca-growing complex in the rural area of Vargas, in the municipality of Santa Cruz de Guachavés, Nariño.

The laboratory, consisting of five structures and a storage center for raw materials and alkaloids, is believed to belong to the Comuneros del Sur organized armed group, José Luis Cabrera Ruales unit. At the site, soldiers from the No. 1 Anti-Narcotics Brigade discovered three underground tanks containing 32,580 gallons of cocaine hydrochloride in the process of being produced. In addition, 1,800 kilograms of cocaine, 2,500 kilograms of solid precursors, and 35 industrial items used for processing narcotics were seized.

According to military intelligence, this criminal organization reportedly had a monthly production capacity of four metric tons of cocaine, which was shipped via the Pacific coast of Nariño to Central America and the United States. Through this operation, CONAT disrupted the illicit finances of this armed organization by 162,339 million pesos and prevented the distribution of nearly 1,800,000 doses of cocaine.
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The National Army will continue to carry out sustained operations to weaken drug trafficking networks and disrupt their illicit funding sources, thereby contributing to the protection of the population and the security of the national territory against this transnational criminal phenomenon.