Black Eagles

Black Eagles
LeadersVicente Castaño (disappeared)
Dates of operation2006–2011
IdeologyAnti-communism
Counter-insurgency
Political positionRight-wing to far-right
Battles and warsColombian Armed Conflict
Preceded by
AUC

Black Eagles (Spanish: Águilas Negras) was a term describing a series of Colombian drug trafficking, right-wing, counter-revolutionary, paramilitary organizations made up of new and preexisting paramilitary forces, that emerged from the failures of the demobilization process between 2004 and 2006, which aimed to disarm the United Self-Defense Units of Colombia (AUC).

The Black Eagles were first considered to be a third generation of paramilitary groups, but Colombian military reports suggest they were intermediaries in the drug business between the guerrilla and drug cartels outside Colombia.[1] As of 2007, they were reported to be active in the city of Barrancabermeja.[2] According to Fundación Paz y Reconciliación, Black Eagles ceased to exist around 2011.[3] Since then, there is no evidence of an armed structure, camps or a military hierarchy; instead, the term Águilas Negras is used as a "franchise" by different, unrelated criminal gangs.

  1. ^ "Revista Cambio: Farc y las Águilas Negras se alían en negocios de narcotráfico en el sur de Bolívar" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 6 October 2008.
  2. ^ Caleb Harris (12 March 2007). "Paramilitaries re-emerge in pockets of Colombia". USA Today. Associated Press. Retrieved 27 August 2012.
  3. ^ "'Las Águilas Negras' no existen: Fundación Paz y Reconciliación". www.radionacional.co. Retrieved 2023-11-16.