Colombian opposition party Polo Democratico (PDA) said Monday the country’s police and intelligence agency DAS are continuing to illegally wiretap opposition politicians.
Senator Alexander Lopez, spokesman of the socialist PDA said he has seven witnesses who corroborate the party’s claims that DAS director Felipe Muñoz is informed about the alleged illegal wiretapping practices and a “smear campaign” against the opposition party.
According to Lopez, the administration of President Juan Manuel Santos is “showing that everything is the same as with the government of [former President Alvaro] Uribe” by allowing the intelligence chief to stay on.
The socialist party spokesman said his party regrets Muñoz staying on as DAS director despite official charges indicating he has been occluding evidence of illegal wiretapping practices by the intelligence service.
According to the government, the DAS is in the process of being dismantled following a series of scandals that linked the agency to drug trafficking, ties to paramilitary death squads and the illegal spying on Supreme Court judges, journalists, opposition politicians and human rights groups.
One of the agency’s former directors is in jail for ties to paramilitary groups while a second fled the country before the Supreme Court filed a warrant for her arrest over her alleged involvement in the wiretap scandal.
