Gold was being searched underground, on the surface there were traces of severe environmental damage that could take more than a decade to recover.
In the rural area of the municipality of Hobo, where water should feed peasant life, plantations and ecosystems in the center of the department, the authorities found a different scenario: improvised structures type rudimentary tent and machinery used in illegal activities that altered the fauna, flora and environmental balance of the region.
Troops of the High Mountain Battalion No. 9, of the Ninth Brigade, in coordination with the Colombian Aerospace Force, and in an inter-institutional manner with the CTI (Technical Investigations Corps) of the Attorney General's Office and the Regional Autonomous Corporation of Alto Magdalena (CAM), conducted an intervention in the village Las Vueltas that managed to find and intervene two mining production units used for activities of illicit exploitation of mining deposits.
During the military operation, three people were arrested and seven motor pumps used for irregular gold mining were seized. The authorities are making progress in the investigations to establish possible links of this illicit activity through financial structures of residual organized armed groups that commit crimes in the department of Huila, including the Jorge Suárez Briceño bloc and its Iván Díaz structure.
Beyond the elements intervened and the arrests made, the main success of this operation was to prevent environmental damage of great proportions, linked to deforestation and the pollution of important water sources.
According to estimates by the environmental and social authorities, these illicit activities could generate a production of close to 2,100 grams of gold per month, with an approximate commercial cost of 972 million pesos, resources that would presumably be used to strengthen illegal activities and logistical and criminal resources of these organized armed groups. In the same way, the confiscated elements represent an economic loss of more than 14 million pesos for these illegal structures.
Source: Press – Fifth Division
