Former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe was sentenced to 12 years in the House of Representatives for witness tampering and fraud charges.
The 73-year-old is the first former president in the country to be convicted of a crime. He was also banned from public office and fined $578,000 (£435,000).
Uribe told a judge in Bogota that he would appeal his conviction. He said the purpose of the case was to “destroy the voices of the democratic opposition.”
He served as president from 2002 to 2010 and was still popular in Colombia despite being accused of working with right-wing paramilitaries to destroy leftist rebel groups. He denied the claim.
The former president was convicted On Monday, two charges have been 13 years in a case where witnesses were assaulted.
Two predecessor soldiers sentenced to jail provided evidence that Uribe’s former lawyer Diego Cadena provided them with money to prove Uribe’s support.
Cadena also faces charges, who denied the charges and testified along with several other former products to represent Uribe.
Earlier this week, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned Uribe’s conviction and accused Colombian judiciary of being weaponized.
Rubio wrote on social media that the former president’s “only crime is to fight relentlessly and defend his homeland.”
The paramilitary group emerged in Colombia in the 1980s with a clear goal of undertaking poverty and marginalization. They fought with the Marxist guerrilla groups in the style of Marxism with the Marxist guerrillas that fought the state twenty years ago.
Many armed groups that developed during the deadlock have earned income from the cocaine trade. Their deadly battle with the state has brought lasting competition to trafficking routes and resources.
Uribe has been praised by Washington for his hard-working attitude towards the rebels of the left-wing Colombian revolutionary armed forces — but a split politician, critics say he has not paid for his efforts to address inequality and poverty in the country.
The Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces signed a peace agreement with Uribe’s successor in 2016, although violence by disarmament groups in Colombia remains.
