A social leader is assassinated and his wife kidnapped in northern Colombia

MADRID, 20 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The NGO Redepaz Antioquia has denounced this Friday the murder of social leader Elmer Lenin Guerra Castro and the kidnapping of his partner, Yuliana Galeano Lujan, both held by armed groups in the municipality of Segovia, in the Antioquia region, in northwestern Colombia. when they returned home.

Both activists would have been kidnapped on Thursday afternoon, when the armed men would have made Guerra and Galeano get out of a vehicle. They first found Guerra's body on the road; After civil organizations thought that the attackers had also killed the couple, they found Galeano alive.

These two leaders had participated in a humanitarian refuge created on August 4 by civil organizations due to the increase in violent actions by armed groups --Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AGC), ELN, FARC dissidents-- with the aim to protect the area, strategic for its natural resources, explains the newspaper 'El Colombiano'.

The High Commissioner for Peace of Colombia has deeply regretted the fact and has shown its solidarity with the family of Lenin and the organizational processes of the municipalities.

"There are more than 30 years of violence that have brought pain, destruction of dreams and life projects in this region," the High Commissioner said in a statement.

Likewise, he has appealed to the AGC, also known as the Clan del Golfo, --to whom the attack is attributed-- "to act in coherence with their public announcement of a ceasefire since last August 7."