We deserve to be calm in our municipality
Armed dissidents from the 'Jaime Martínez' front attacked Los Pinos military base, sparking overnight clashes with Colombian Army forces. This marks the second major attack in days—a police station was targeted two days prior with gunfire and drone strikes in the 34,000-person municipality.
- Los Pinos military base attacked night of January 16, 2026
- Suárez municipality has approximately 34,000 residents
- Police station attacked two days prior with gunfire and drones
- Dissident faction identifies as 'Jaime Martínez' front
- No casualty figures released from military base attack
Dissident guerrillas attacked a military base in Suárez, Cauca on January 16, triggering combat operations. The municipality faces escalating violence including drone strikes on police facilities.
The municipality of Suárez, nestled in the northern reaches of Cauca department, has become a stage for escalating violence. On the night of January 16, armed dissidents from a faction calling itself the Jaime Martínez front launched an attack against Los Pinos, a military installation in the town. The assault triggered hours of combat that stretched into the following day, with clashes between the insurgent group and Colombian Army forces reverberating through a municipality of roughly 34,000 people.
Residents alerted authorities as the fighting unfolded, but the immediate toll remains unclear. Military sources have not released casualty figures from the base attack, though Army officials indicated that soldiers were being deployed to the region in greater numbers in response. The silence on casualties is itself telling—it suggests either that the full picture has not yet been assessed, or that the military is withholding details while operations continue.
This attack did not emerge in isolation. Just two days earlier, the same dissident group had struck the local police station with gunfire and drone strikes, a coordinated assault that signaled a deliberate campaign against state security infrastructure. The pattern is unmistakable: Suárez is being targeted systematically, and the state's security apparatus is being tested repeatedly.
César Cerón, the town's mayor, has responded with an unusual kind of plea. Rather than calling for military escalation, he invoked a moment of normalcy that his town had briefly experienced. During carnival celebrations the previous weekend, he noted, residents had gathered in the streets for concerts and festivities without fear. They had lived, for a few days, as though peace were possible. "The people of Suárez want to live in peace," Cerón said. "We deserve to be calm in our municipality."
His words carried an implicit rebuke of the violence consuming his town, but also something more: a suggestion that the current path—attack, response, escalation—is not inevitable. He called on the national government to intervene, but not necessarily with more troops or firepower. Instead, he appealed for "another way out of this conflict." It was a mayor's gamble: that somewhere in the machinery of state and insurgency, someone might be listening to the voice of a town that has tasted peace and found it worth fighting for, not with weapons, but with words.
Citas Notables
The people of Suárez want to live in peace. We deserve to be calm in our municipality, as we proved during the recent carnival when we all enjoyed concerts and activities peacefully in our streets.— César Cerón, mayor of Suárez
It is necessary to seek another way out of this conflict.— César Cerón, mayor of Suárez
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does the mayor's statement about the carnival matter? It seems like a small detail in the middle of a military conflict.
Because it's the only moment in the story where someone names what normal looks like. The carnival isn't nostalgia—it's evidence. He's saying: we know this is possible, we just did it.
But can a mayor's plea actually change anything when you have armed groups attacking military bases?
Probably not on its own. But it matters that he's saying it publicly, in a newspaper, rather than just accepting the cycle. He's creating a record that the town wants something different.
The source doesn't give casualty numbers. Does that mean nobody died?
No. It means the military hasn't released them yet, or they're still being counted. In a firefight that lasted hours, there were almost certainly injuries at minimum. The absence of a number isn't the same as the absence of harm.
Why attack a military base and a police station in the same week? What's the strategic goal?
It's about demonstrating capability and will. You're showing the state that you can strike at its security forces, that you're organized, that you're a threat worth negotiating with—or worth fearing.
And the army's response of deploying more troops—does that solve the problem?
It might contain the immediate threat. But the mayor's question is whether containment is enough, or whether something else needs to happen. More soldiers in the streets is not the same as peace.