Because of a commandant’s orders innocent civilians died

The information given to us was that the Army came here every four days. They came at night. The commander planned an ambush. We went to wait for them but there were no Army vehicles. We realized that if the Army came and the cars exploded, then the whole village would explode. The explosion would kill the civilians since the road was really close.

Rogelio was my best friend at the guerrilla and he was my confidant. He lived in the area. He hadn’t seen his father, mother and grandfather during the last five years. When we arrived he said, “Hey, we are close to my grandfather.”

It was 6:30, it was dusk and two cars passed by. The commander said, “Detonate that!”, “Let that shit explode!” We had been there for four days eating just sardines and the important thing was to be taken out of that place never to be sent back again.

Everything exploded when a car arrived; legs and dismembered bodies flying. All the people from that house were killed. They were Rogelio’s grandfather and uncles, along with his cousins. All of them were civilians, and killed. I cried because I felt sorry for the civilians who were suffering; we could listen to those that didn’t die.

It was 1 in the morning. Rogelio was sitting here, bored, when we heard, Pum! The shot… Rogelio killed himself. He was twenty.

We asked the commander if we should go and fetch the body in order to take it with us. He said, “leave that son of a bitch there, if he died it is because he didn’t want to live, let the vultures eat him.”

Some days after that, we found out that the people from Piamonte [Cauca] had taken and buried the body.