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Andean Group - April 2012 (ISSN 1741-4466)

COLOMBIA: Naranjo bids goodbye

The news that General Oscar Naranjo had submitted his resignation after five years at the helm of Colombia's national police (PN, 17 May 2007-1 July 2012) was music to the ears of criminal groups. In his 36-years in the force, Naranjo has not only accrued the reputation of being a one-of-a-kind commander, but he had also spearheaded the improvements made to intelligence gathering units, promoting the cooperation amongst the intelligence branches of all security services, that enabled the governments of Alvaro Uribe (2002-2010) and Juan Manuel Santos to deliver the worst hits suffered by the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) and other illegal armed groups (both the right-wing paramilitaries and their successor groups, commonly known as Bacrim) in their history. He will be missed by both the government, for whom Naranjo's public reassurances that security policy continued to move in the right direction provided a welcomed political respite, as well as by the general public, which has come to love him as a father figure. Naranjo has accomplished what very few officers of the law have managed to do in Latin America: he is a household name when it comes to integrity and honesty within the police force.

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