On the 21st local time, the Colombia anti-government armed force "National Liberation Organization of Colombia" issued a statement denying that the organization used ships to drug trafficking. The statement said the "National Liberation Organization of Colombia" had been the target of actions by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to link it to drug trafficking, but these efforts "failed."

The U.S. Defense Secretary said on October 19 that the U.S. military launched an attack on a drug trafficking vessel of the "Organization for the National Liberation of Colombia" in the area of responsibility of the U.S. Army's Southern Command on October 17, when the vessel was sailing along a known drug trafficking line, killing three men.

Founded in 1964, the National Liberation Organization of Colombia is the second largest anti-government guerrilla group in Colombia, after the former Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which has been at war with the government since its inception.