On Jan. 27, local authorities in Teorama, in Colombia’s Norte de Santander province, said they had found 13 bodies in several rural hamlets in the La Cecilia district. The initial account, given by municipal official Celso Rincón, pointed to a scene that was already being described locally as part of the wider Catatumbo crisis, where armed clashes had pushed civilian communities into a worsening emergency.
Rincón said the bodies were found in the veredas Vegas de Oriente, San José de Vegas and El Rosario. In his first description of the victims, he said two were women and three were minors between 14 and 16 years old. The official added that the dead were believed to be combatants from Front 33, a dissident faction of the FARC, though the identification was still preliminary and had not yet been formally confirmed by national authorities.
The reported deaths came against the backdrop of more than a week of fighting in the Catatumbo region between Front 33 and the National Liberation Army, or ELN. The local official described the killings as part of a wider “hunt” by the ELN to weaken FARC dissident control in the area. The dispute is tied to a strategic corridor used for coca cultivation, drug trafficking, fuel smuggling and extortion, making the region one of Colombia’s most volatile flashpoints.
The toll on the population has been severe. The report cited official records from Medicina Legal showing 41 other deaths in the wider escalation. It also said the Ministry of Defence had put the number of displaced people at 48,004, with 619 others evacuated with army support from towns including Tibú, El Tarra, Convención and San Calixto. Those figures underline how quickly the fighting has moved beyond a local confrontation and into a mass displacement crisis.
Rincón also said there had been earlier, unconfirmed reports that the number of dead might reach 18, but only 13 bodies had been recovered and identified at the time of the report. He added that four more people may have been wounded in the clashes, with two allegedly handed over to the community for medical attention and two others taken away in an unknown direction. That detail, like the broader casualty count, remained subject to official verification.
The local account also raised a stark concern about the involvement of minors. Rincón said the presence of children among the dead was evidence that armed groups are recruiting young people and cutting short lives that should not have been drawn into the conflict. For now, though, the most reliable conclusion is the narrow one supported by the report: authorities in Teorama found 13 bodies, the fighting in Catatumbo was still active, and the human cost continued to rise as the region waited for clearer confirmation from defence and forensic officials.
As of the report, national authorities had not issued a fuller public statement on the circumstances of the deaths. That left the local account as the clearest available description of what happened in Teorama, and a reminder that the conflict in Catatumbo is now producing not only battlefield casualties but a wider public safety emergency across one of Colombia’s most contested border regions.
The report's remaining uncertainty lies in identification. Local officials said the bodies were found, but the final forensic picture was still pending national confirmation. That means the local account should be treated as a field report, not a final casualty audit. Even so, the episode fits the larger pattern in Catatumbo: when armed groups clash over territory and illicit rents, communities often learn the scale of the damage before officials can complete the paperwork.
