Relatives of disappeared brace themselves as bodies are exhumed from notorious mass grave in Colombia

Original article by Harriet Barber in Medellín

When Operation Orión began in October 2002, Hermey Mejía thought the violence that had ravaged his corner of Medellín for decades would finally come to an end.

The 22-year-old told his mother, Teresa Gómez, that he hoped Colombia’s armed forces would get rid of the urban guerrillas who ruled the streets of Comuna 13, then one of the most dangerous districts in the world. The area, of strategic importance for drugs and weapons trafficking, had long been trapped in a cycle of bloodshed: first under Pablo Escobar’s narcos, then, after their fall, leftwing militias.

Instead, as the military sought to wrest back control, the streets became a battlefield once more.

“Bullets, bullets, bullets, from above, in front of our homes, everywhere,” said Gómez. “They killed many people. Many more were taken. We all lived with fear.”

The largest urban military assault in Colombia’s history was brutal. Helicopters fired on the streets from above; residents were dragged away in front of their families; women and girls were sexually abused; hundreds of people were arbitrarily detained, tortured or killed.

At the time, the operation was hailed by figures such as then mayor Luis Pérez Gutiérrez and then president Álvaro Uribe as a victory against insurgents.

But in the years since, Orión has also become a byword for the collusion between the army and rightwing paramilitaries, with testimonies revealing that the illegal groups entered alongside troops, kidnapping and killing suspected guerrilla collaborators. After the operations ended, the paramilitaries took control of the neighbourhood, ruling through fear, extortion and forced disappearances.

“Hermey turned to me,” recalled Gómez. “He said, ‘Mum, these people are bad, these people are bad, we need to leave.’” Gómez told her son that they had nothing to hide. But then on 18 December 2002, Hermey, a computer engineering student and father-to-be, was forcibly disappeared.

“He went out with his friend. He said he would be right back,” said Gómez. “But they took him.”

For more than two decades Gómez and her family have fought for answers, searching the streets, filing complaints and petitioning the government. Years later, a former paramilitary confessed to participating in Hermey’s disappearance, admitting he had known at the time that the young man was innocent. But his body has never been found.

Now Gómez hopes new excavations at a site known as La Escombrera will uncover his remains, and allow her family to finally lay him to rest.

“Hermey is here,” said Gómez, looking down at the excavation site. “I can feel it.”

La Escombrera, a former construction landfill, is one of the most notorious mass grave sites in urban Latin America. Armed groups have admitted to using it in the late 1990s and early 2000s to dispose of the people they abducted, tortured and killed, their bodies increasingly covered by an ever-growing pile of industrial waste.

It is unknown how many are buried there, but estimates range from 400 to 600.

“La Escombrera represents what violence and disappearance meant in Colombia during the conflict that took place over the last 60 years,” said Carlos Manuel Bacigalupo Salinas, a forensic anthropologist working at the site. “In this constant search for control, by the various armed agents, many people ended up disappearing.”

Victims’ families and groups like the National Movement for Victims of State Crimes have long called for investigations into La Escombrera, but for years their requests went unanswered.

“People said we were crazy, that we were lying,” said Luz Elena Galeano, 62, whose husband, Luis Javier Laverde Salazar, was disappeared in 2008. “It was known back in the 2000s that this was the spot where the bodies were taken, but nobody would look.”

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An earlier excavation in 2015 failed to uncover remains, shattering the families’ hopes. But now the search has been taken up by the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), a tribunal established after the 2016 peace deal to investigate and prosecute crimes that happened during Colombia’s armed conflict.

Armed with satellite imagery, the testimony of former paramilitaries who have admitted to killing and burying people in La Escombrera, and investigations by the attorney general’s office, excavations are again under way.

The task has been mammoth, said Salinas , describing it as one of the most significant forensic operations ever undertaken in Colombia – and possibly the world. About 56,000 cubic metres of rubble have been removed so far, with heavy machinery scraping only shallow layers under close supervision. Every load of earth is then sifted for human remains or traces of evidence. Those visiting Comuna 13 – now one of Colombia’s most popular tourist sites following a successful urban regeneration programme – can see the white forensic tents high on the hillside.

In December 2024, the forensic team unearthed the first human skeletal remains, a significant breakthrough after more than two decades of searching.

“At times we have our setbacks and moments of fragility due to sadness, but we continued our search, and finally we have had discoveries,” said Galeano, part of Women Walking for Truth, a group of 40 who take turns overseeing the excavation work. “We know we will continue finding bodies here. We will keep going, we will keep looking.”

Seven bodies have been found so far, four of which have already been identified and given to their families, with three cases still pending identification. Work is now starting on an area where a former paramilitary leader said between 40 and 50 people were buried.

More than 120,000 people were estimated to have gone missing in Colombia between 1985 and 2016, and the fate of most of them is still unknown. “We are doing everything possible and everything necessary,” said Salinas.

Looking down over the hills where her son was taken, Gómez said: “People say I will never find him. But a mother never forgets, she never forgets.”