BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Miguel Uribe, a conservative Colombian presidential hopeful, was in critical condition on Monday after being shot in the head from close range during a rally over the weekend.
In a statement, doctors said the 39-year-old senator had “barely” responded to medical interventions that included brain surgery following the assassination attempt that has had a chilling effect on the South American nation.
Uribe was shot on Saturday as he addressed a small crowd of people who had gathered in a park in Bogota’s Modelia neighborhood.
On Sunday hundreds of people gathered outside the hospital where Uribe is being treated to pray for his recovery. Some carried rosaries in their hands, while others chanted slogans against President Gustavo Petro.
“This is terrible,” said Walter Jimenez, a lawyer who showed up outside the hospital with a sign calling for Petro’s removal. “It feels like we are going back to the 1990’s,” he said, referring to a decade during which drug cartels and rebel groups murdered judges, presidential candidates and journalists with impunity.
Petro has condemned the attack and urged his opponents to not use it for political ends. But some Colombians have also asked the president to tone down his rhetoric against opposition leaders.
The assassination attempt stunned the nation, with many politicians describing it as the latest sign of how security has deteriorated in Colombia, where the government is struggling to control violence in rural and urban areas, despite a 2016 peace deal with the nation’s largest rebel group.
The attack on Uribe comes amid growing animosity between Petro and the Senate over blocked reforms to the nation’s labor laws.
Petro has organized protests in favor of the reforms, where he has delivered fiery speeches referring to opposition leaders as “oligarchs” and “enemies of the people.”
“There is no way to argue that the president … who describes his opponents as enemies of the people, paramilitaries and assassins has no responsibility in this,” Andres Mejia, a prominent political analyst, wrote on X.
On Monday, Colombia’s Senate said it will suspend sessions for an undetermined number of days to show its solidarity with Uribe. The Senate was expected to vote this week on labor legislation that Colombia’s president wants to enact through a referendum.
Also on Monday, in a joint statement nine opposition parties said they will turn to “international entities” that can provide them with “conditions of equality that have been denied” to them by Colombia’s government. The parties also called on the Inspector General’s office to create a commission that will guarantee transparency and security in elections.
The Attorney General’s office said a 15-year-old boy was arrested at the scene of the attack against Uribe. Videos captured on social media show a suspect shooting at Uribe from close range.
The suspect was injured in the leg and was recovering at another clinic, authorities said. Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez added that over 100 officers are investigating the attack.
On Monday, Colombia’s Attorney General Luz Adriana Camargo said that minors in Colombia face sentences of up to eight years in detention for committing murders.
Camargo acknowledged that lenient sentences have encouraged armed groups to recruit minors to commit crimes. However, she said that Colombian law also considers that minors who are recruited by armed groups are victims, and is trying to protect them.
“As a society we need to reflect on why a minor is getting caught up in a network of assassins, and what we can do to stop this from happening in the future,” she said.
Camargo said officials had not identified any death threats against Uribe prior to Saturday’s assassination attempt. But on Monday, Uribe’s lawyer said he has sued the director of the National Protection Unit, a government agency that assigns security guards and bullet proof vehicles to politicians and human rights leaders.
Uribe launched his presidential campaign in October. His lawyer, Victor Mosquera, said the National Protection Unit ignored multiple requests by Uribe to have his security detail expanded as he campaigned.
“His security detail had to be improved,” Mosquera said in a press conference. “We have to investigate whether the attack (on Uribe) was a consequence of negligence.”
In a message on X on Monday, Petro wrote that Uribe’s security detail was “strangely” reduced from seven to three bodyguards on the day of the assassination attempt, and said he asked police to investigate.
Petro said there are still many theories about the motive for the attack.
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