Residents of Ocaña and Cúcuta, in Colombia’s northeastern Norte de Santander department, were jolted awake before sunrise on Sunday, September 6, by the roar of supersonic fighter jets flying at unusually low altitude over their cities. The sudden military display alarmed many locals, who took to social media to share videos and photos of the aircraft streaking across the pre-dawn sky.
The flyovers, carried out by the Colombian Air Force’s Kfir jets, came directly in response to a spike in violence in the Catatumbo region over the weekend. Just days earlier, an attack attributed to the National Liberation Army (ELN), a leftist guerrilla group that has waged war against the Colombian state for decades, targeted the El Trapiche military base using explosive-laden drones. The assault killed three soldiers and drew swift condemnation from Colombia’s national Ombudsman’s Office, which denounced the attack as a violation of humanitarian norms.
Catatumbo, a rural border area near Venezuela, has long been a stronghold for armed groups involved in drug trafficking and has seen repeated clashes between guerrilla factions and government forces. The military’s show of air power appears intended to reassure residents and signal that authorities are responding forcefully to the latest escalation.
For the full story in Spanish, read the original report at El Tiempo.
Source: Aviones de combate Kfir sobrevuelan Ocaña y Cúcuta tras ataque terrorista en el Catatumbo (eltiempo.com). English version produced with AI assistance.
Image: Defence Images, BY-SA 2.0 (via Openverse).