Colombia Orders Probe Into Ties Between Military and Drug Traffickers

The Colombian military said Monday it had opened an investigation into allegations that senior army and intelligence officials advised the leader of an armed drug-trafficking group about how to secretly buy weapons and evade military scrutiny.

The revelations, reported by the major Colombian media outlet, Caracol, have stoked fears that former guerrilla fighters who now smuggle cocaine have infiltrated high levels of the security forces under President Gustavo Petro, a former member of a leftist guerrilla organization. Petro has feuded with President Trump over U.S. airstrikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean and overseen fraying relations with the U.S. over soaring drug-crop cultivation and cocaine trafficking.