![\"People](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2272561946.jpg\" "\\"People")
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People stand next to vehicles destroyed by a bomb attack at El Tunel, on the Popayan-Cali road, in Cajibio, Cauca department, Colombia, on April 25, 2026. <\/p>\n
FRANCISCO CALDERON<\/p>\n
AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Bogot\u00e1, Colombia<\/p>\n
The death toll from an explosive attack in Colombia on Saturday has risen to 20, according to authorities, with over 36 more injured.<\/p>\n
The government blames a dissident faction of the demobilized FARC rebels for detonating an explosive-laden minibus on the Pan-American Highway in the southwestern Cauca province.<\/p>\n
The explosion was part of a wave of attacks in recent days which have rocked Cauca and fueled security concerns ahead of presidential elections next month.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a tragedy that has torn our department apart and plunged our families into deep mourning. There are no words to describe the pain we feel today,\u201d said the governor of Cauca, Octavio Guzm\u00e1n Guti\u00e9rrez, in an X post. He later announced three days of official mourning in the province.<\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s bombing was the most fatal in a string of attacks in Cauca in recent days, which is one of the regions most affected by Colombia\u2019s internal armed conflict.<\/p>\n
Despite a 2016 peace agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the country has seen a resurgence in violence in recent years as new armed groups consolidate power over the drug trade and illegal mining.<\/p>\n
Authorities say Saturday\u2019s attack was perpetrated by the Central General Staff, EMC, a rebel group under the command of infamous ex-FARC commander Ivan Mordisco.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose who carried out the attack\u2026 are terrorists, fascists and drug traffickers,\u201d President Gustavo Petro posted on X following the bombing. \u201cI want the strongest possible global action against this narco-terrorist group\u2026 I want the people of Cauca to be freed from this mafia.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the Petro administration has faced criticism, with Governor Guzm\u00e1n calling on stronger action from the national government.<\/p>\n
\u201cCauca cannot continue to face this barbarity alone.\u2026 We call on the national government to take decisive, sustained and effective action in response to the serious public order crisis we are facing,\u201d Guzm\u00e1n wrote on X, calling for the Ministry of Defense to deal with the crisis.<\/p>\n
On Saturday night, Defense Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez travelled to Cauca and pledged a crackdown on terrorism.<\/p>\n
The latest attack is part of a trend of increased violence against civilians in Colombia\u2019s armed conflict, analysts say.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bottom line here is that the EMC, who the authorities have accused of being responsible for these attacks, has a pattern of attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure that is very alarming,\u201d said Elizabeth Dickinson, deputy director for Latin America at the Brussels-based International Crisis Group.<\/p>\n
She noted that while civilians are increasingly caught in the crossfire of rebel attacks on security forces, Saturday\u2019s bombing marked \u201ca new low in terms of the level of indiscriminality.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Red](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2272558862.jpg\" "\\"GettyImages-2272558862.jpg\\"")
Red Cross workers operate at the site of an explosion as people look on after a bomb attack at El Tunel, on the Popayan-Cali road, in Cajibio, Cauca department, Colombia, on April 25, 2026. JOAQUIN SARMIENTO AFP via Getty Images <\/p>\n
The bombing was part of a string of attacks in Cauca in recent days, according to the state government.<\/p>\n
It fuels wider security concerns in Colombia, which has proven a key issue ahead of first-round presidential elections scheduled for May 31.<\/p>\n
Ivan Cepeda, the leftist candidate from Petro\u2019s Historic Pact party, has pledged to continue the current administration\u2019s strategy of \u201cTotal Peace,\u201d which aims to negotiate peace deals with armed groups.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe effect of this attack on the election is likely going to be minimal against Cepeda, considering his very solid voting block perceives this as another signal that negotiations must prevail,\u201d said Sergio Guzman, director of Colombia Risk Analysis, a Bogot\u00e1-based political risk consultancy.<\/p>\n
Cepeda, whose running mate, Aida Quilcue, is an Indigenous senator from Cauca, condemned the attack in an X post and highlighted that it had targeted Indigenous people in a stronghold for his party.<\/p>\n
But Cepeda\u2019s right-wing rivals seized the opportunity to criticize what they describe as the failure of peace negotiations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe time has come to admit, in no uncertain terms, that the Total Peace initiative has FAILED,\u201d wrote Paloma Valencia, the candidate for the right-wing Democratic Center party, in response to Cepeda\u2019s statement on X.<\/p>\n
Valencia, who is also from Cauca, proposes an iron fist against armed groups in the same vein as her political mentor and party leader, former President Alvaro Uribe.<\/p>\n
The attack \u201cwill give steam to members of the opposition who want to end negotiations and move forward with a more aggressive plan to face the [rebels],\u201d Guzman said.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the bombing compounds concerns about the democratic process in rural areas run by armed groups.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis really has a chilling effect across the population,\u201d said Dickinson, adding that \u201cin an electoral context, we would ideally want the opposite. We would want people to feel freedom of movement and an ability to cast their vote without these sorts of pressures.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People stand next to vehicles destroyed by a bomb attack at El Tunel, on the Popayan-Cali road, in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248042,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[123,125,124],"class_list":["post-248041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}