Colombia's most-wanted guerrilla commander has threatened to "intervene" in the country's 2026 presidential election, escalating tensions after government airstrikes killed at least fifteen minors recruited by armed groups. Ivan Mordisco, leader of the Estado Mayor Central (EMC)—the largest dissident faction to reject the 2016 FARC peace accord—called the operations a "declaration of war" in a video released on November 18–21, 2025. National registrar Hernán Penagos responded with defiance, insisting that "nothing will impede" the electoral process in a democratic state.
The threat exposes the volatile intersection of Colombia's fragmented post-peace landscape, the human rights cost of aerial bombardment, and the operational challenges of securing an election across territories where the state competes with armed groups for control. President Gustavo Petro has intensified military pressure on cocaine-trafficking organizations, ordering a million-dollar manhunt for Mordisco and comparing him to Pablo Escobar. But the strikes have triggered a political reckoning: Defence Minister Pedro Sanchez now faces a censure motion over the deaths of child recruits, and Petro—who once condemned such operations from opposition—confronts accusations of hypocrisy.