Colombians bid farewell to presidential hopeful Uribe after shooting at political rally

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Colombians on Wednesday bid farewell to senator and presidential hopeful Miguel Uribe Turbay, who died more than two months after being shot during a political rally in the South American country’s capital.

Family, friends, members of Congress and a delegation of government officials from the United States honored Uribe, whose coffin was draped with Colombia’s flag. The 39-year-old died Monday in the hospital where he had been since the June 7 shooting. Thousands of mourners paid their respects Tuesday.

“The bullets that took his life not only broke the hearts of his family, they reopened the fractures of a country that has yet to find peace,” Senate President Lidio García said, referring to Colombia’s long history of violence against politicians.

Uribe had become one of the strongest critics of Colombia’s current government. In October, he joined the list of politicians seeking to replace Gustavo Petro, the first leftist to govern Colombia, in the May 2026 elections.

Petro and Vice President Francia Márquez on Wednesday said on social media that they would not attend Uribe’s funeral out of respect for his family’s wishes.

“We are not going not because we do not want to, we simply respect the family and avoid that the funeral of Senator Miguel Uribe is taken over by supporters of hate,” Petro posted on X.

Uribe was shot three times, twice in the head, while giving a campaign speech in a park in a working-class Bogota neighborhood. Authorities have arrested six people, including the teenager they say shot him, but they have not determined who ordered the attack or why.

The shooting, caught on multiple videos, alarmed Colombians who have not seen this kind of political violence against presidential candidates since Medellin drug lord Pablo Escobar declared war on the state in the 1990s.

Uribe’s mother, well-known journalist Diana Turbay, was among the victims in that period. She died during a police rescue after being kidnapped by a group of drug traffickers led by Escobar seeking to block their extradition to the U.S.

“If my mother was willing to give her life for a cause, how could I not do the same in life and in politics?” Uribe, who was 5 when his mother was killed, said in an interview with a Colombian news outlet last year.

The senator’s family said he would be buried Wednesday at Bogota’s Central Cemetery. The cemetery is the oldest in the city and the final resting place of figures such as Liberal leader Luis Carlos Galán, who was shot dead in 1989 while giving a presidential campaign speech in Bogota.