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Colombian senator Miguel Uribe dies after June campaign shooting Colombian senator Miguel Uribe dies after June campaign shooting
(about 3 hours later)
Rightwing presidential hopeful, who had been in hospital in Bogotá since shooting, has died aged 39Rightwing presidential hopeful, who had been in hospital in Bogotá since shooting, has died aged 39
The Colombian senator and presidential hopeful Miguel Uribe, who was shot in the head at a campaign event two months ago, has died, the hospital treating him has said. Miguel Uribe, the Colombian senator and presidential hopeful who was shot in the head at a campaign event in June, has died, his wife has confirmed.
Uribe, a member of a prominent political family and a lawmaker for the rightwing opposition, was shot on 7 June in Bogotá, where he was speaking to try to secure his party’s nomination for 2026 elections. Uribe, an opposition candidate with the rightwing Centro Democrático party, was shot twice in the head and once in the leg during a campaign stop two months ago while vying for his party’s nomination for the 2026 elections.
His wife, Maria Claudia Tarazona, announced his death on social media. “I ask God to show me the way to learn to live without you,” she wrote. “Rest in peace, love of my life, I will take care of our children.“ He spent nine weeks in intensive care and had several surgeries before succumbing to his injuries early on Monday aged 39.
The attack was the worst act of political violence in around two decades and evoked memories of the turbulent years of the 1980s and 90s, when four presidential candidates were murdered in separate attacks blamed on drug cartels. In a statement posted online, his wife, María Claudia Tarazona, addressed her late husband and promised to take care of their children. “I ask God to show me the way to learn to live without you,” she wrote. “Rest in peace, love of my life, I will take care of our children.”
The capital’s Santa Fe Foundation hospital, where supporters held regular vigils during Uribe’s treatment and repeated operations – said over the weekend his condition had worsened because of a haemorrhage in his central nervous system. On Monday it announced he had died at 1.56am (0656 GMT). She added: “Wait for me, because when I fulfil my promise to our children, I will come looking for you and we will have our second chance.”
The former president Alvaro Uribe, the leader of the senator’s Democratic Centre party and no relation to the deceased lawmaker, wrote on X that “evil destroys everything; they killed hope”. Six people have been arrested in connection with the 7 June shooting, including a teenage boy identified as the alleged gunman. In footage of his arrest, the teenager was heard shouting that he had been hired by a local drug dealer and claiming “I did it for money for my family”.
“May Miguel’s fight be a light that illuminates Colombia’s right path,” added the ex-president, who was sentenced by a judge this month to 12 years of house arrest for abuse of process and bribery of a public official. Authorities have stressed they are pursuing the “intellectual authors” of the attack, and at least three adults are facing charges of using a minor to commit a crime. Colombia’s national police director, Carlos Fernando Triana, said another arrested man, Élder José Arteaga Hernández, known as El Costeño, was among those who had orchestrated the attack.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, wrote on X that he was saddened by the news. “The United States stands in solidarity with his family, the Colombian people, both in mourning and demanding justice for those responsible.” The defence ministry has offered a 3bn peso (about £550,000) reward for information leading to the identification and capture of the culprits, and said the US, Britain and the United Arab Emirates were helping with the investigation.
Six people were arrested over the shooting, including two men that the attorney general’s office says met in Medellín to plan the assassination. Colombia’s leftwing president, Gustavo Petro, offered his condolences to Uribe’s family, saying: “Life is above any ideology.” He said: “For decades, revenge has fuelled violence. No more. Miguel’s death hurts us as if he were one of our own. It is a defeat.”
A 15-year-old boy accused of carrying out the shooting was arrested within hours of the crime, but police have said they are pursuing the “intellectual authors” of the attack. In a video of the boy’s arrest in June, independently verified by Reuters, he can be heard shouting that he had been hired by a local drug dealer. The assassination was the worst incident of political violence in Colombia in two decades and has reignited fears of a return to the country’s bloody past when organised crime and rebel groups murdered political candidates, journalists and judges with impunity. Between 1986 and 1990, five presidential candidates were murdered, while grassroots political activity was frequently targeted.
The defence minister, Pedro Sánchez, vowed on Monday to catch those responsible. “We will not allow the violent to intimidate or silence political voices needed in our democracy,” he wrote on X. Uribe’s mother, the journalist Diana Turbay, was killed in 1991 during a botched rescue mission after she was kidnapped by the Medellín cartel, headed by the drug lord Pablo Escobar.
His ministry has said there is a 3bn peso (about £550,000) reward for information leading to the identification and capture of the culprits, and that the US, Britain and the United Arab Emirates are helping with the investigation. “If my mother was willing to give her life for a cause, how could I not do the same in life and in politics?” Uribe, who was five when his mother was killed, said in an interview last year.
The death of Uribe adds further tragedy to his family’s fraught history. His mother, the journalist Diana Turbay, was killed in 1991 during a botched rescue mission after she was kidnapped by theMedellín cartel, headed by the drug lord Pablo Escobar. Despite a 2016 peace deal between the government and the country’s main rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc), violence has continued and new groups have emerged into the vacuum. Earlier this year, fighting between two armed groups near the Venezuelan border led to the displacement of more than 50,000 people. In June, a wave of bomb attacks across Cali, the country’s third largest city, and several nearby towns killed at least seven people and wounded 50.
Uribe enjoyed a rapid political rise, as a lawmaker for the rightwing Democratic Centre party and presidential hopeful known for his sharp criticism of the administration of the leftwing president, Gustavo Petro. Uribe hailed from one of Colombia’s most prominent political families – he was the grandson of the former president Julio César Turbay Ayala – and enjoyed a rapid political rise. The lawyer, who held a master’s degree from Harvard University, entered politics as a Bogotá councillor aged 25 and by 2022 he had secured the highest number of votes within the conservative Democratic Centre party.
In videos posted on social media the day he was shot, Uribe called for respect for the separation of powers and rejected a referendum pushed by Petro on a labour reform bill. He had also criticised the president’s restrictions on the oil industry, promising a plan to attract investment and give companies legal security. Known for his sharp criticism of Petro, Uribe argued for a hardline approach to armed groups. He was not considered a frontrunner in the upcoming presidential vote, the first round of which is due in May.
At 25, Uribe was elected to Bogotá’s city council, where he was a prominent opponent of Petro, then the capital’s mayor, criticising his handling of waste management and social programmes. Isaac Morales, of the Bogotá-based Peace and Reconciliation Foundation, which monitors political-electoral violence, said: “With Uribe Turbay’s death, democracy in Colombia is lost and the electoral outlook for 2026 is very uncertain.”
In the 2022 legislative elections, Uribe led the senate slate for Democratic Centre. Since the shooting, Uribe’s seat in thesenate has been draped with a Colombian flag. María José Pizarro, a leftwing senator whose father was assassinated on the presidential campaign trail in 1990, said that while Uribe “represented ideas different from mine”, his “voice deserved respect in the democratic arena”.
His maternal grandfather, Julio César Turbay, was Colombia’s president from 1978 to 1982, while his paternal grandfather, Rodrigo Uribe Echavarria, headed the Liberal party and supported Virgilio Barco’s successful 1986 presidential campaign. She said: “Unpatriotic minorities continue to kill, understanding only the language of violence and seeking to influence the nation’s destiny with bloodshed.”
Uribe is survived by his wife, son and stepdaughters, and his father and sister.