- 33 - members named “Operation coup de grâce” was about to be implemented. According to a complaint by Senator Cepeda Vargas himself, the principal objectives of this plan were Carlos Lozano, at that time Director of the weekly publication Voz; José Miller Chacón Peña, then a member of the Executive Committee of the PCC; Hernán Motta Motta, Senator of the Republic for the UP at the time; Aida Abella, then President of the UP; Álvaro Vásquez del Real, then Secretary General of the PCC; Gilberto Vieira, and Manuel Cepeda Vargas, at that time Representative to the Chamber.114 91. The so-called “coup de grâce plan” was denounced in August 1993 by Manuel Cepeda Vargas, Hernán Motta Motta, Ovidio Marulanda and Octavio Sarmiento during a meeting with the Minister of Defense at the time, Rafael Pardo Rueda.115 In a letter sent to Aida Abella following this meeting, the Minister of Defense stated that he had been informed of the said plan, which appeared to have originated among senior Army officers. In this regard, he indicated that, even though “they had not provided any evidence about [the said plan] or the names of those presumably involved,” he would send an official letter the office of the Prosecutor General of the Nation informing the latter of the content of the meeting “so that any necessary steps could be taken.”116 Furthermore, in a letter sent to the then Director of the weekly publication Voz, he indicated that “the Heads of the Armed Forces had been informed of the matter.”117 92. In October 1993, then Representative Manuel Cepeda Vargas denounced before the Congress of the Republic the seriousness of the situation facing members of the PCC and the UP, “owing to the pubic declarations of high-ranking Army officers repudiating communism and thus encouraging the paramilitary groups, which had killed many of their members, and also owing to the existence of an “extermination plan.”118 Senator Cepeda affirmed that high-ranking Army officers119 maintained close “links with [the] paramilitary groups.”120 93. It is well-known that José Miller Chacón Penna, one of the UP leaders who had been named as a possible victim of the “coup de grâce plan” (supra para. 90), was murdered on November 25, 1993. As a result, the Commission expanded the precautionary measures granted (supra para. 89) “to avoid the murder of the National 114 Cf. letter to Amnesty International of July 27, 1993 (evidence file, tome III, attachment 12 to the application, folios 1374 to 1375). 115 Cf. also the testimony given by Mr. Motta Motta during the public hearing held before the Inter-American Court on January 26, 2010, and the letter from the then Minister of National Defense, Rafael Pardo Rueda, of August 2, 1993, addressed to Aida Abella E., President of the Patriotic Union (evidence file, tome III, attachment 15 to the application, folio 1383). 116 Cf. letter from the then Minister of National Defense, Rafael Pardo Rueda, of August 2, 1993, addressed to Aida Abella E., President of the Patriotic Union, supra note 115, folio 1383. 117 Letter from the Minister of Defense of November 30, 1993, addressed to Carlos A. Lozano Guillén, Director of the weekly publication Voz (evidence file, tome III, attachment 24 to the application, folio 1406). 118 Judgment delivered by the Third Section of the Administrative-law Chamber of the Council of State in Investigation No. 250002326000199612680-01 (20,511) on November 20, 2008 (evidence file, tome XVIII, attachment 57 to the brief in answer to the application, folio 8117). Also, Cf. gazette of the Congress of the Republic of Colombia of October 5, 1993 (evidence file, tome III, attachment 7 to the application, folios 1346 to 1347). 119 General Harold Bedoya Pizarro filed a criminal complaint against the then Representative to the Chamber, Manuel Cepeda Vargas, based on his declarations in the said parliamentary debates. According to the office of the Second District Attorney, this complaint “was finally closed by the Ethics Commission of the Chamber of Representatives based on the principle of the immunity of the opinions issued by the members of Congress in the exercise of their functions.” Evaluation Report by the Second District Attorney for Santafé de Bogotá, Disciplinary procedure No. 143-6444, of July 11, 1997, supra note 96, folio 1423. 120 Gazette of the Congress of the Republic of Colombia of October 19, 1993 (evidence file, tome III, attachment 9 to the application, folio 1350).