A former Colombian general has been sentenced to 31 years in prison almost four decades after a deadly operation to free hostages from the country's Justice Palace which was occupied by guerilla forces, local media reported on Wednesday.
Members of the now extinct Marxist guerrilla movement M-19 occupied the seat of Colombia's Supreme Court on November 6, 1985, in what became known as the Palace of Justice siege. They held the Supreme Court justices as well as dozens of other people hostage.
When the military stormed the building a day later, 98 people, including Supreme Court justices, were killed and 11 others went missing.
In 2015, then-president Juan Manuel Santos acknowledged that the military bore responsibility for the bloody end to the hostage situation.
Supreme Court judges ruled on Wednesday that retired army general Iván Ramírez Quintero was responsible for the forced disappearance of a female M-19 fighter.
Besides the 80-year-old, Lieutenant Colonel Fernando Blanco Gómez, 77, was also convicted, with the court overturning a previous acquittal from 2011.
The men will only have to start serving their sentences once the judgement becomes final.
Colombia's current President Gustavo Petro also belonged to the M-19 guerilla organization during the 1980s and served two years in prison for unauthorized possession of weapons.
He has denied involvement in M-19's occupation of the Palace of Justice in 1985.
After M-19 was demobilized by 1990, Petro helped to found the political party that replaced the guerrilla group. He also participated in drafting the country's constitution in 1991.