Second man charged over shooting of Colombia presidential candidate
Colombian prosecutors on Thursday charged a second man with attempted murder over the shooting of Colombian presidential candidate Miguel Uribe at the weekend.
Carlos Eduardo Mora Gonzalez stood accused of participating in the "logistics" of the attack and of driving the vehicle used to deliver the gun to the 15-year-old suspected shooter, who is already in custody.
Uribe, a 39-year-old conservative senator, was shot twice in the head and once in the leg while giving a speech in a park on June 7 in western Bogota.
He remains in critical condition but doctors said Wednesday he was showing signs of improvement.
The attack stunned Colombia and raised fears of a return to the country's bloody past of political, cartel and paramilitary violence.
The alleged shooter, who was captured near the scene by Uribe's bodyguards after himself being shot and injured in the leg, said he acted "for money, for my family."
At his arraignment this week, however, he pleaded not guilty to the attack.
Mora Gonzalez is accused of carrying out a "reconnaissance" mission in the working-class Fontibon neighborhood two days before the attack.
Besides attempted murder, he has been charged with "using minors in the commission of crimes" and of weapons possession.
He was remanded in custody.
Prosecutors say that on the day of the attack he was in the car which delivered the 9mm Glock used in the attack to the gunman.
A source close to the case told AFP he was the driver of the vehicle.
The teen, whose identity has been withheld because of his age, got into the car and changed his clothes, according to investigators.
- Family with tragic history -
Uribe is a member of the Democratic Center party of former right-wing president Alvaro Uribe. The two men are not related.
Miguel Uribe is the son of Diana Turbay, a famed journalist who was killed after being kidnapped by Pablo Escobar's Medellin Cartel, and grandson of Julio Cesar Turbay, who led Colombia from 1978 to 1982.
The authorities believe the 15-year-old shooter was a hired gun, but it is not yet known who ordered the hit.
If convicted he faces up to eight years in prison, in keeping with sentencing rules for minors.
Uribe's lawyers claim that his repeated requests for increased security were ignored.
Colombia is experiencing its biggest security crisis in a decade.
On Tuesday, the country was rocked by a string of 24 coordinated bomb and gun attacks that killed at least seven people across the southwest, where government forces are fighting FARC dissidents.
Uribe has been a strong critic of Colombia's first left-wing president, Gustavo Petro, who sought in vain to make peace with the country's various remaining armed groups.
In recent months, Petro, a former left-wing guerrilla, has been accused of dialling up the political temperature by labelling his right-wing opponents "Nazis."
Petro has speculated the shooting was ordered by an international "mafia" or by dissident members of the defunct FARC guerrilla group who refused a 2016 peace deal.
als/das/cb/nl
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