DREAM / The Prime Minister resigns and wakes up under the Parisian bridge!

 Kliko këtu për të tjera
Voxpress:

A special "death squad", who were "Los Pepes" who killed Escobar

2022-08-31 08:25:37Kosova&Bota SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX

A special "death squad", who were "Los Pepes" who killed

Pablo Escobar was one of the most notorious drug lords in the world. Based in Medellin, Colombia, Escobar's brutal reign over the illegal cocaine industry claimed thousands of lives in the country.

His merciless strikes against judges, government officials and the police were swift and deadly. He even spent a period in a rich prison called the Cathedral, which he built himself.

But Escobar made many enemies.

One of them was Fidel Castano, a rival drug lord who was perhaps even more brutal than Escobar himself. The most climactic moment for Castano occurred when Escobar killed two prominent members of his cartel – Fernando Galeano and Gerardo Moncada while they visited Escobar at La Catedral.

Castano was scheduled to be at that meeting, but he declined to go.

This decision saved his life and turned him into a paramilitary leader.

The government turned a blind eye to Escobar's activities until the murders of Galeano and Moncada. The drug kingpin killed them both while staying in his luxury prison. But instead of facing the government, Escobar escaped from his prison in July 1992, reports abcnews.al.

Tired of how Escobar was ruining everything, they built the drug cartels, Castano decided to run everything. He organized Los Pepes, or "Perseguidos por Pablos Escobar", which translates to People Persecuted by Pablo Escobar.

Los Pepes received funding from the Cartel, the main rival of Escobar's organization. The CIA and US government even helped Los Pepes try to track down Escobar by relying on Castano's intelligence-gathering efforts. Castano opened an office in Medellin where people came and gave information about Escobar's activities.

Although fictional, the Netflix series Narcos plays with the Castano vs. Escobar dynamic. Los Pepes had guns, bombs, ammunition, and of course they were motivated to take down Escobar.

Any power vacuum in the Colombian cartels would give the people a chance to rise up. Leading a cartel can be worth billions of dollars.

Los Pepes were more of a terrorist organization than a paramilitary group.

As long as Escobar's interests were hindered or limited, the group didn't care about the collateral damage. The members of Los Pepes had things under control. In February 1993, the CIA complained that government forces in Colombia were sharing information with Los Pepes.

The group, in turn, used the intelligence to carry out a series of bombings in retaliation for Escobar's own bombings. Because Escobar had contacts with government officials, Colombian officials constantly relied on Los Pepes as an extralegal organization to dispense justice without law enforcement.

There were several assassination attempts on Escobar. The closest was planting a car bomb, which almost killed his children. Manuela Escobar, his daughter suffered from partial deafness due to the explosion. The assassination also targeted Escobar's lawyers, supporters and anyone close to the drug lord, reports abcnews.al.

Eventually, Los Pepes forced Escobar into hiding. He was living in Los Olivos, a middle-class house in Medellin, in December 1993 when Colombian intelligence intercepted a phone call from the drug lord to his son, Juan Pablo Escobar.

Colombian police, as part of the group known as the Search Block, arrived at the house where Escobar lived. In a scene reminiscent of a Hollywood movie, the drug lord ran across the rooftops in Los Olivos. The police overpowered him and his bodyguard, and Escobar couldn't get away fast enough. Shots in the leg, chest and ear killed Colombia's most notorious drug cartel leader on December 2, 1993.

There have always been two controversies surrounding the death of Pablo Escobar.

The first is that the police took pictures of the men standing over the bleeding corpse as he lay on a roof.

The second is that Los Pepes took credit for the death of Pablo Escobar.

Whether Los Pepes managed to kill Escobar or escalated his decline after 16 months outside prison, Escobar's death marked a turning point for Colombia. Violence was finally eliminated in the country and citizens could go on with their lives without brutal drug wars.


Në përputhje me standarded JTI

Video

SHIKO KANALIN NE YOUTUBE
×