Colombia’s ex-president Álvaro Uribe will face trial for witness tampering and fraud, prosecutors have announced, once again casting the spotlight on allegations that the former leader partnered with paramilitary death squads in his war against leftist rebels.
Uribe has long been accused of committing a litany of crimes at the peak of Colombia’s six decades of brutal conflict, but has never been brought to trial, and he remains one of the country’s most powerful political figures. The prosecutor’s office said it decided to call the 71-year-old to trial after reviewing new “physical evidence and material evidence collected and studied by the office.”
The conservative leader is credited by supporters for beating back powerful guerrilla insurgencies such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which controlled vast swathes of the country at the turn of the century and were encroaching on major cities.
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