Engineers aboard an inflatable boat approaching the US empire's patrol boat, USS Thunderbolt, in the Adriatic Sea, June 13, 2000. Photo: AP/File photo.
Caracas (OrinocoTribune.com)—Colombian President Gustavo Petro has announced the militarization of his country’s border with Venezuela in the Catatumbo region, a move reportedly aimed at combating drug-mafias. He added that he had also requested a militarization of the region’s border by the Venezuelan side, “to minimize the mafia’s forces.”
“I have ordered the Colombian army to increase the number of troops in Catatumbo,” he stated on social media this Thursday, August 28. “We have 25,000 soldiers in the area. It’s not the land that wins over the mafia; it’s the coordination between the two states that achieves it.”
Solicité la militarización de la frontera del Catatumbo del lado Venezolano, para lograr reducir al máximo las fuerzas de la mafia.
He ordenado al ejército Colombiano ampliar el número de efectivos en el Catatumbo colombiano.
Tenemos 25.000 soldados en la zona.
No es la tierra… https://t.co/FYziZdRgVM
— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) August 28, 2025
The announcement follows Venezuela’s activation of “Peace Zone Number One” on Monday in the states of Táchira and Zulia, on Venezuela’s side of the Catatumbo region. President Nicolás Maduro ordered the move to fight drug trafficking amid military threats from the US empire.
That evening, President Maduro announced that “we are going with 15,000 men and women, well-armed, well-trained, and well-prepared” to reinforce the entire binational Peace Zone, a territory that stretches from Táchira state to La Guajira. Venezuelan authorities insisted on the importance of a similar deployment on the Colombian side of the border.
During the closing of a military ceremony Thursday, President Maduro thanked his Colombian counterpart for his support in combating drug gangs, following the Colombian president’s troop deployment announcement.
“I thank Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who has ordered the reinforcement of 25,000 troops, a new force, throughout the entire Catatumbo region of Colombia,” he said. “Thus, the coordination of Binational Zone Number One advances, for the good of sovereignty, peace, and the future of our border towns. Venezuela and Colombia act united for peace, because we ourselves care for, guard, and preserve our lands.”
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The coordination occurs as President Petro has challenged the US empire’s narrative on the drug trafficking motives behind its recent military deployment in the Southern Caribbean. On August 25, the Colombian president stated that the so-called “Cartel of the Suns” is made up by US imperialism and far-right politicians as a “fictitious excuse to overthrow governments that don’t obey them” and to obtain Venezuela’s resources, in line with their history of regime change. Colombian Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez Suárez has reaffirmed that “the Cartel of the Suns does not exist.”
President Petro further clarified on social media that the passage of Colombian cocaine through Venezuela is controlled by a mafia known as the Drug Trafficking Board, whose bosses live comfortably in Europe and West Asia, according to Colombia’s investigations. He noted that he has proposed to the US empire and Venezuela that they jointly destroy the cartel.
Special for Orinoco Tribune by staff
OT/JRE/AU
