DAS director Felipe Muñoz will present a report to Colombian Congress Tuesday, detailing the continued infiltration of DAS by criminal gangs, and will recommend that the scandal-plagued security agency be dismantled.
Narco-paramilitary leader Pedro Olivero Guerrero, alias “Cuchillo,” allegedly infiltrated the DAS, by paying two DAS officials from the Meta department to pass information on to his gang, reports El Tiempo.
According to Muñoz’s report, thus far, 116 DAS employees have been fired, 38 of whom have been charged with crimes stemming from the illegal wiretapping scandal.
The wiretapping scandal has been growing for the past few weeks, as more information becomes public regarding DAS’s illegal spying activities against Colombian journalists, politicians, and judges, in addition to foreign NGOs and governments.
As a result of the various scandals that have hit the intelligence agency, Muñoz admitted that it is time to dismantle the organization, claiming that its current structure is “inviable,” and that previous efforts to reform the spy agency have all been merely “cosmetic.” Muñoz proposes starting a new agency from scratch, one with more effective internal control systems and more highly paid agents.
