Colombia’s National Police captured a top Venezuelan of the Tren de Aragua criminal organization, hours after a second fugitive jumped to his death from his luxury apartment in Medellín. The recent offensive against TdeA comes as the leftist government of President Gustavo Petro also ruled out any possibility of peace talks with the transnational gang. The United States also carried out a fifth deadly strike on suspected narco vessels off the coast of Venezuela on Tuesday, showing – once again – Washington’s willingness to use military force far from its shores.
In La Ceja, Antioquia, police arrested Adrián José Rodríguez Gudiño, known as “Adriancito,” one of Venezuela’s most wanted fugitives and a prominent figure in the Tren de Aragua (TdeA). The operation, conducted jointly by Colombia’s Gaula Police, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the U.S. Marshals Service, took place on a national holiday when Rodríguez Gudiño was intercepted while walking through the town center.
Authorities claim Rodríguez Gudiño had been living in Antioquia since the second half of 2023, using profits from criminal operations to buy and sell cars and motorcycles in an attempt to pass as a legitimate businessman. In Venezuela, he was considered one of the most dangerous members of the TdeA, with activities concentrated in Zulia, Cabimas and Maracaibo.
Rodríguez is accused of leading kidnapping, homicide, theft and extortion rings and gained notoriety in 2016 after escaping from a maximum-security prison known as Retén de Cabimas, later demolished in 2021. His only prior record in Colombia dates back to 2020, when he was briefly detained in Cundinamarca for illegal possession of a firearm.
In the nearby municipality of Sabaneta, Ender Alexis Rojas Montán, a 31-year-old Venezuelan and linked to the gang’s operations in Chile, died Monday evening after falling from a fifth-floor balcony as an anti-kidnapping squad raided his apartment. Rojas Montán had been arrested in Chile on charges of illicit association and kidnapping but fled the country after posting bail in 2023. Interpol, Colombia’s National Police and Chile’s Investigative Police located him in a residential complex in southern Valle de Aburrá following a year-long joint investigation. As police forced entry, he attempted to escape through the balcony but fell to his death.
The arrests and operations come as the Colombian government rejected a formal request by Tren de Aragua to join the “total peace” policy, President Gustavo Petro’s broad negotiation frameworkwith illegal armed groups. In a letter addressed to President Petro, Larry Amaury Álvarez Núñez, known as “Larry Changa,” a cofounder of the gang, sought to initiate exploratory peace talks. Justice Minister Eduardo Montealegre ruled out the possibility, stating that the government would not allow criminal organizations to use peace processes to avoid prosecution.
Chilean President Gabriel Boric, speaking from Rome on Wednesday, linked the activities of Tren de Aragua and the Maduro regime’s reach across borders. “Dictatorships cross borders to impose fear,” he said, hours after the targeted attack in Bogotá against two Venezuelan exiles. Boric, nearing the end of his term, has been one of the few Latin American left-wing leaders to openly denounce human rights abuses by the Venezuelan regime, including what he described as transnational repression. He referred to the murder of a former Venezuelan soldier in Chile, in which one of the suspects is allegedly linked directly to Maduro’s Minister of the Interior Diosdado Cabello.
While Colombian authorities intensified their actions against TdeA operating within the department of Antioquia, the United States has escalated military operations against traffickers allegedly linked to the organization in the Caribbean. On Tuesday, President Donald Trump announced a new strike on a vessel off the Venezuelan coast, the fifth known U.S. attack in the region since early September. The strike killed six people, bringing the total death toll from the series of bombings to 27.
The first attack took place on September 2, killing 11 people. Two more strikes followed on September 15 and 19, each resulting in three deaths. A fourth attack occurred on October 3, when U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reported four fatalities aboard another vessel. The White House has provided few details on how the U.S. military determines that those targeted are members of Tren de Aragua.
The organization, not known for playing a major role in international drug trafficking, has expanded its activities in Colombia’s largest cities, from extortion and human smuggling to control of micro-trafficking. President Trump and senior officials have repeatedly blamed the group for contributing to violence and illicit drug distribution within the U.S., framing it as a key transnational threat.
Tren de Aragua emerged more than a decade ago inside a notorious prison in Venezuela’s central Aragua state. Its expansion has paralleled the exodus of over 8 million Venezuelans fleeing economic and political turmoil. Countries with large Venezuelan migrant populations, including Peru, Chile and Colombia, have attributed a wave of violent crimes to the organization. Authorities in Chile first identified its operations in 2022, noting that its early activities centered on human trafficking, border control and sexual exploitation, later expanding into kidnapping, extortion and drug route control.
The recent operations in central Colombia and the Caribbean mark an intensification of regional efforts to disrupt the group’s leadership and logistics. Analysts warn that Tren de Aragua’s ability to infiltrate local economies reflects the destabilizing influence of Nicolás Maduro, which they link to both the regime-controlled Cartel of the Suns (Cartel de los Soles) and the more diffuse, shadowy TdeA network operating across borders.
