Assassinations in Colombia: the trail of blood that has marked politics

Bogotá.- Political violence has marked Colombia with several assassinations throughout its history, including the most recent, Senator and presidential pre-candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, one of the right-wing's cards for the 2026 elections, who died this Monday in Bogotá, 64 days after having been seriously injured in an attack.

The following is the list of assassinations committed in the country since the beginning of the 20th century, which begins and ends with the surname Uribe:

1. Rafael Uribe Uribe, 1914

General Rafael Uribe Uribe, head of the liberal troops defeated by the conservatives in the Thousand Days' War (1899-1902), was murdered with axes on the side of the National Capitol on October 15, 1914. Uribe Uribe, politician with liberal ideas that he defended in Congress and on the battlefield, was a lawyer, military man, senator, diplomat, journalist, and one of the most prestigious public figures in the country. He was also the first amnestied and demobilized person assassinated in Colombia after signing peace with the victors of the Thousand Days' War.

2. Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, 1948

The liberal leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, who was emerging as the favorite for the 1949 presidential elections, was shot to death on April 9, 1948, as he was leaving his lawyer's office in downtown Bogotá, which triggered a wave of violence that went down in history under the name of 'El Bogotazo'. A lawyer and politician with inflamed oratory, the caudillo led the opposition to the conservative regime of President Mariano Ospina Pérez due to the rampant political violence following the defeat of the Liberal Party in the 1946 elections, in which it was divided between the official candidate David Turbay and the dissident Gaitán.

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The cry of "They killed Gaitán" spread like wildfire through the streets of Bogotá where gaitanismo, made up of popular sectors, lynched the attacker, Juan Roa Sierra, so that it was never possible to know if he acted alone or if someone commissioned this never-clarified assassination. According to newspapers of the time, that day ended with the intervention of the Army and at least 550 deaths, a figure that researchers raise to more than 2,000 in Bogotá alone, not counting those from other regions of the country to which the violence spread.

3. Jaime Pardo Leal, 1987

It was in 1986 that the first presidential candidate of the Patriotic Union (UP), a left-wing party born a year earlier as part of a peace attempt by then-President Belisario Betancur (1982-1986) with the FARC guerrillas, was nominated. However, the UP was the victim of an extermination campaign in which at least 5,733 of its members were murdered or disappeared, including Pardo Leal, shot by hitmen on October 11, 1987, when he was traveling in his car with his family.

4. Luis Carlos Galán, 1989

Like Gaitán, the liberal politician Luis Carlos Galán was the favorite to win the 1990 presidential elections when he ended up being shot to death on August 18, 1989, during a rally in the town of Soacha, south of Bogotá. Lawyer, economist, journalist, and politician, Galán was Minister of Education at only 27 years old and later ambassador to Italy, councilor of Bogotá, and senator.

Galán was characterized by his harsh speech against the infiltration of the drug trafficking mafia in politics, which is why they assassinated him.

Two of his sons have been senators of the Republic and one of them, Carlos Fernando Galán, is the current mayor of Bogotá.

5. Bernardo Jaramillo Ossa, 1990

In the bloodiest presidential campaign Colombia can remember, the assassination of Galán was followed on March 22, 1990, by that of Bernardo Jaramillo Ossa, Pardo Leal's successor as presidential candidate of the Patriotic Union. Jaramillo Ossa, lawyer and senator, was shot to death by a hitman when he was in the facilities of the Bogota air bridge.

6. Carlos Pizarro Leongómez, 1990

He was the last commander of the M-19 guerrilla, which he led on March 9, 1990, to sign the peace with the government of President Virgilio Barco (1986-1990), and entered politics as a presidential candidate of the newly created Democratic Alliance M-19. On April 26, 1990, less than two months after signing the peace, Pizarro was assassinated by a hitman who shot him on a plane in mid-flight when he was heading to Barranquilla for an electoral event. More than three decades later, Gustavo Petro, who in his youth was a member of the M-19, became President of Colombia, while Senator María José Pizarro, daughter of the murdered leader, aspires to that position in the next elections.

7. Álvaro Gómez Hurtado, 1995

Three-time presidential candidate (1974, 1986 and 1990), the lawyer, journalist, diplomat, writer and politician Álvaro Gómez was the most representative figure of the Conservative Party in the second half of the 20th century and was assassinated in Bogotá on November 2, 1995.

Considered one of the most important thinkers in the country, Álvaro Gómez could not be president because he carried the weight of being the son of former president Laureano Gómez (1950-1953), nicknamed 'the Monster', by those who consider him one of the instigators of political violence in the country.

8. Miguel Uribe Turbay, 2025

Senator Miguel Uribe Turbay, from the right-wing Democratic Center party, was seriously injured in an attack on June 7, 2025, while speaking to a group of supporters in a park in the Bogota neighborhood of Modelia and died 64 days later. Uribe Turbay was the grandson of former Liberal President Julio César Turbay (1978–1982) and son of journalist Diana Turbay, who was murdered in January 1991 by the Medellín cartel, which had her kidnapped for six months.