SUMMARY
Las Águilas Negras (Black Eagles) was a decentralized group which emerged in the aftermath of the AUC demobilization process, which began demobilizing in 2003, following an agreement with the Colombian government. Through the dissolution process, many of the former AUC members rejected demobilization and re-engaged in criminal activities. Some of them merged into the newly formed and factionalized Las Águilas Negras group.
Armed groups operating under the name Las Águilas Negras first appeared in 2006 in the provinces of Catatumbo, Northern Santander and Nariño, some of Colombia’s most dense coca cultivation areas. Las Águilas Negras eventually seized control over former AUC’s drug trafficking corridors in several departments of Colombia, from Cordoba to Sucre, Chocó and the Urabá region in Antioquia, rapidly expanding their presence in most of the country.
As a fragmented network group spread across the country, Las Águilas Negras never had a clear, centralized leadership. Instead, they operated through a decentralized structure, with numerous local factions functioning independently and maintaining their own leadership, lacking a unified chain of command, making them a loosely connected network rather than a single, structured entity. However, despite this apparent fragmentation, the group still operated under a common banner, suggesting a unifying factor – such as a shared criminal purpose, or perhaps a loose coordination from a central figure or faction leader, whose influence tied the various groups together. While each faction operated independently, the shared objectives and occasional directives from a central figure or coordinating entity helped maintain the semblance of unity within the broader network.
Frequently, the group’s name has been used as a generic term to denote different paramilitary successors, who continued their activities of threat, extortion and contracting of civilians and activists. Allegedly, the only figure ever considered as a leader of the group was Vicente Castaño, a founding member of AUC.
By 2008, Las Águilas Negras had become one of the largest and most violent paramilitary organizations in Colombia. Some factions of the group spread pamphlets across the country, using them as a tool of intimidation to threaten left-wing social and political leaders. These pamphlets also served as grim announcements of so-called “social cleansing” campaigns, in which the group vowed to target criminals, drug dealers, and drug users. Their operations further blurred the line between political violence and organized crime, perpetuating a climate of fear and impunity.
Although Las Águilas Negras never issued an official statement announcing its dissolution, the group’s activity seemed to slowly decrease from 2011.
Las Águilas Negras has been involved in the one-sided category of UCDP organized violence.
