Explosives records found in Viacha: “The documents cannot establish what caused the detonations”

Bolivia’s Army has found records documenting explosives stored at the Bolívar Artillery Regiment in Viacha, but the files do not answer the central question surrounding the explosions that killed six people.

Army chief Gen. Héctor Alejandro Alarcón said investigators located records of the receipt, inventory, deactivation, destruction and incineration of materials from 2019 and 2020. The documents include a September 2019 record showing that the regiment received explosive material for storage.

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We must clarify that the existence of these records and inventories cannot by itself establish what caused the detonations.

The associated inventory lists 94 boxes of boosters, equivalent to 2,900 units, along with 400 boxes containing different types of firecrackers. Other documents from 2020 refer to pyrotechnic material brought to the facility for destruction, as well as records covering several deliveries of items designated for disposal.

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The documentary inventory records 94 boxes of boosters, equivalent to 2,900 units, and 400 boxes corresponding to different types of firecrackers.

Alarcón stressed that the figures cannot simply be added together or treated as proof that all the material remained at the site when the explosions occurred. Investigators are instead trying to establish what entered the regiment, what was destroyed, returned or transferred, what was written off, and how much material was actually recorded as remaining.

“We must clarify that the existence of these records and inventories cannot by itself establish what caused the detonations,” Alarcón said. The Army is coordinating with the Public Prosecutor’s Office to obtain documents linked to the area under investigation. It expects access to the affected zone when procedural and technical conditions allow, without disturbing the scene, compromising the chain of custody or interfering with examinations by prosecutors, the Special Force to Fight Crime and the Institute of Forensic Investigations.

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We are reconstructing the complete documentary chain of custody: what entered, what was destroyed, what was returned or transferred, what was written off, and how much actually remained recorded.