Author: Matthew Bocanumenth

Colombia’s Special Jurisdiction for Peace Must Open a Macro Case on Sexual Violence

On March 17, WOLA and nine other national and international civil society organizations published a statement calling on the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz, JEP)—the 2016 peace accord’s transitional justice tribunal—to open a macro case to investigate sexual violence in the context of Colombia’s internal armed conflict.

According to the organizations, Colombia has an international obligation to act with due diligence to prevent, investigate, and prosecute sexual violence perpetrated by both state and non-state armed actors and to provide reparations to victims. The obligation to document, investigate, and prosecute these crimes, particularly against women and LGBT+ persons, and to adopt a gender-sensitive analysis of major international crimes has taken root and become increasingly ingrained in the culture of international justice.

The peace accord and the norms that regulate the functioning of the JEP incorporate a gender-based focus that see sexual violence as an autonomous crime with no concessions. These obligations, together with the principle of centering victims, commit the JEP to prioritize the rights of all victims of sexual violence. The opening of a national macro case would make visible, in an autonomous and specialized manner, the way in which discrimination affects rights to sexual liberty, integrity, and autonomy of the victims. A macro case is essential to materialize the approach of centralizing victims, which should guide the actions of the JEP.

Given the historical and very high level of impunity for these crimes, along with the low level of acknowledgment by those responsible, the JEP has a responsibility to generate conditions to overcome these barriers and guarantee their rights to truth, justice, and reparation. Civil society and victims have insisted that this is an urgent measure for the satisfaction of victims’ rights, as opening the macro case would improve their situation. The peace accord and the laws that develop it gave the JEP instruments to investigate sexual violence.

Read the full Spanish statement here.
Read the unofficial English translation here.

Tags: Gender Perspective, LGBT+, Sexual Violence, Special Jurisdiction for Peace, Transitional Justice

March 18, 2022

Victim Seats in Congress Could Help Advance Peace in Colombia

By Matthew Bocanumenth and Felipe Puerta Cuartas
(Cross-posted from www.wola.org)

On March 13, the regions hardest hit by Colombia’s internal armed conflict will have the unprecedented opportunity to elect congressional representatives for 16 new, temporary “peace” seats in Colombia’s House of Representatives. Implementing these seats, devised in the 2016 peace accord, has been no easy feat. At the same time, the electoral process has been marred with risks and challenges that are illustrative of the entrenched dynamics of violence, racism, and political exclusion this historic mechanism was designed to overcome.

The peace seats represent 16 Special Transitory Peace Districts (Circunscripciones Transitorias Especiales de Paz, CITREP) strategically located in 167 municipalities where central state and institutional presence are traditionally weak. These are regions where armed actors inflicted violence against a high number of victims, multidimensional poverty is substantial, and a dependency on producing illicit crops remains to be a prevalent need for many residents.

The identified municipalities have rarely had the opportunity to elect representatives in Congress to advocate for their needs. The peace accord sought to rectify this lack of political representation by providing 16 congressional seats over two legislative terms for Colombia’s over 9 million victims, many of whom are Afro-Colombian and Indigenous. In fact, the Truth, Coexistence, and Non-Repetition Commission—a key component of Colombia’s transitional justice system—identified that 17 of the 22 corridors of violence during the conflict are resided mainly by ethnic communities. By changing the configuration in Colombia’s House of Representatives from 171 members to 187 members for the next eight years, the seats are ultimately meant to uplift the voices of these victims in the halls of power and help integrate their needs and territorial perspectives into the national political agenda.

While a noble effort at reconciliation, the mechanism has encountered a series of obstacles from the government itself. In 2017, after months of debates through both congressional chambers, many representatives saw the legislation to create the peace seats as a given. However, in late November of that year, the then-President of the Senate illegitimately blocked the legislation from passing by claiming an insufficient quorum, despite the securing of an absolute majority vote. This move tabled the legislation and prevented the peace seats from operating in the 2018 legislative elections. Obstructing the legislation pushed back the legal codification of this key peace accord commitment by four years. Reviving the legislation was only made possible in May 2021 when the Constitutional Court ruled in favor of a constitutional writ (tutela). On August 26, 2021, the Iván Duque administration finally abided by the ruling and promulgated the law to create the 16 peace seats. Ironically, after having obstructed the legislation, the Duque government now presents itself as having facilitated these seats and utilizes them as an indicator to show its commitment to peace to the international community.

A lack of awareness about the objectives of the seats has made bringing the mechanism to life a difficult undertaking. Delays and obstructions have meant that some of the initially registered 398 candidates had little to no time to prepare their campaigns. Many candidates have yet to receive their allotted state funding to campaign in rural areas. Skepticism around the process has even prompted some candidates to call for postponing the elections.

Additionally, paramilitary groups, other criminal interests, and traditional political parties have found their way to continue sabotaging the peace process. Such is the case with Jorge Rodrigo Tovar Vélez, the son of the paramilitary leader “Jorge 40,” whose campaign for the peace seat in Valledupar was approved by the National Electorate Council (Consejo Nacional Electoral, CNE). Jorge 40 was recently deported to Colombia after serving 12 years in a U.S. prison for drug trafficking charges. Upon his return, he was sentenced in February 2022 with 40 years in prison for murder and has over 1,400 other pending investigations. Despite this conflict of interest, Tovar Vélez was named the Victims Director in the Ministry of the Interior by the Duque administration. Now, Vélez is running a campaign for a peace seat, with reports indicating that armed actors are intimidating residents to vote for him. Questionable candidates running campaigns for the peace seats raises concerns that this key commitment of the peace accord will not serve its intended purpose.

Alarmingly, the moment is also plagued by a climate of increasing violence by illegal armed groups in the territories these peace seats will represent. Five years after the ratification of the peace accord, the country has broken a five-year record when it comes to the frequency of mass internal displacement. It is experiencing an increase in homicides of different kinds—from targeted killings of social leaders to the massacres of civilians.

The situation is so dire that Colombia’s Electoral Observation Mission (Misión de Observación Electoral, MOE) issued an alert warning that 58 per cent of the municipalities represented by the new peace districts are at high risk for violence and electoral fraud. This electoral cycle for the peace seats has already seen the kidnapping of a candidate in Arauca department, intimidation of a candidate in North Santander department, at least 347 registered complaints of armed threats and intimidation against almost the same number candidates, and even eight contenders rescinding their candidacies because of a lack of guarantees and for fear of their safety. This violence raises major concerns for the security of the victims running campaigns for the peace seats, as threats and assassinations against political and social leaders were terrifyingly rampant throughout the 20th and early 21st century and persist in Colombia’s post-accord context.

In Colombian politics today, candidates are unable to carry out political activities in many regions due to fear for their lives. There is also a lack of accountability against alleged corruption and fraud in elections. This political arena has impeded the country from further democratizing, ensuring the rule of law and social justice, and overcoming economic inequality, all of which have worsened during the ongoing pandemic and have further suffered from the lack of the 2016 peace accord’s implementation.

Given the current security conditions in territories throughout Colombia, the government may arbitrarily suspend the elections for these peace seats at its own disposition for reasons related to public order. Ensuring the security and safety of the candidates running for the peace seats is vital for democracy and peace in Colombia. Evidenced by the historic difficulties for alternative political movements throughout the country to safely participate in traditional electoral structures, this violent legacy of political and social exclusion has strained Colombia’s efforts at peacebuilding.

Colombia’s next Congress will have to commit to advancing peace accord implementation. After years of efforts to obstruct legislation that sought to advance peace and starving the process of adequate funding, bold steps are needed to get peace back on track. The new Congress will also need to pass a tax reform. Given how Duque’s proposed tax reform pushed the country to the brink of crisis, this will need to be done in consultation with civil society. The police repression with which the national protests were met is yet to be adequately investigated or prosecuted and should also lead to serious security sector reforms.

With the introduction of these 16 new peace seats, there is hope for a legislative environment that advances progressive reforms for Colombians. While representing the diverse interests of Colombia’s victims won’t be easy—if supported by the government, the public at-large, and most importantly fellow congressional representatives—the presence of these peace seats in Congress could provide impetus for a legislative agenda centered around human rights and one that tackles Colombia’s structural problems of socioeconomic exclusion and racism—all core objectives of the 2016 peace accord. If the peace seats are able to serve their intended purpose, they ultimately represent a step forward for political participation as a means of reparation.

Tags: Congress of Colombia, Elections, Politics of Peace, Special Congressional Districts, Victims

March 14, 2022

Social Investment is the Path to Peace in Arauca, Colombia

By: Matthew Bocanumenth, WOLA Program Associate

“I’m 25-years-old and my entire life I’ve lived in the midst of armed conflict,” social leader Mayerly Briceño sorrowfully expressed as she spoke about the dire humanitarian situation in Arauca, Colombia—a northeastern department that shares its border with Venezuela. At a January 7 event hosted by the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) and Colombian daily newspaper El Espectador, Briceño formed part of a panel of civil society leaders and experts convened to inform the international community about the realities being lived in Arauca after an outbreak of violence that marked the beginning of 2022 in the department. As the humanitarian situation continued to deepen, Briceño, who profoundly understands the perils of living through ongoing internal armed conflict, took to the streets with several communities throughout Arauca to demand peace, not more militarization.

This recent episode of violence in Arauca over the first weekend of 2022 killed at least 33 people, left many disappeared, and internally displaced hundreds of families and campesinos amid fighting between the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional, ELN) guerrilla and dissidents of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia’s (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, FARC) 10^th Front. On January 19, a car bomb was detonated in Saravena, Arauca in front of a human rights organization’s office. At the date of publication, more than 1,400 individuals have been displaced as a result of the ongoing violence, including over 400 families, and dozens of Venezuelan migrants and refugees living along the border. While horrifying and unacceptable, this surging violence is not surprising.

Decades of Violence in Arauca

Arauca has long felt the effects of Colombia’s internal armed conflict and true social investment, a longtime demand of Araucan civil society, is needed to advance peacebuilding efforts. Arauca is located in a remote region that has historically lacked institutional presence and has been left in the periphery of Colombia’s political and economic life. This lack of investment exists even though the department is the third largest oil producer in Colombia. As contended by Sonia Lopez, spokesperson for the Joel Sierra Human Rights Foundation, “armed conflict has been imposed on Arauca.”

Amid a lack of state presence, the guerrillas imposed their coercive and violent rule across communities in the department. The ELN established its influence in the region in the early 1970s, with the FARC shortly after marking its territorial presence. The discovery of oil in the early 1980s caught the attention of the extractive industry, which began expanding its lucrative operations. The guerrillas often targeted and extorted the oil industry with attacks like those against the Caño Limón–Coveñas pipeline, which is operated by state-owned Ecopetrol and U.S.-owned Occidental Petroleum. Such attacks prompted the Colombian government to deploy its troops to protect this growing industry and its infrastructure.

Violence against Araucan civilians persisted even with the state’s militarized presence in the region. The 1980s were met with the inception of drug trafficking schemes and the 1990s with the disturbing incursions of expansive paramilitary networks. In the 2000s, violent confrontations between the FARC and the ELN deepened Arauca’s humanitarian crisis. Civilians were often caught in the crossfire, harassed and forcibly recruited by these illegal armed actors, and internally displaced from their homes. The guerrillas eventually signed a non-aggression pact in 2010, but estimates for this gruesome period between 2006 and 2010 indicate that these confrontations killed up to 2,000 civilians.

The Colombian state’s military presence has not served to protect communities. Lopez characterized the strategies imposed by the Colombian state in Arauca as a “laboratory for armed conflict policies.” She pointed to the intensified violence seen during the implementation of Colombia’s counterinsurgency initiatives that saw a high incidence of extrajudicial killings, as well as counternarcotics initiatives that undermined the social needs of Araucan communities. With social investment at the forefront of the pleas by Araucan civil society, the state has continuously stigmatized civil society by accusing leaders of collaborating with guerrilla groups. When social leaders and communities at-large carry out activism demanding basic social investment and services, they are stigmatized as insurgents or sympathizers, and essentially persecuted by the state.

Adding yet another layer to an already multifaceted context, Venezuela’s proximity to Arauca—so much so that many residents in the region even tend to hold a binational cultural identity—plays a major role in the policies and narratives the Colombian government chooses to advance. A tense political relationship between the Colombian and Venezuelan governments has often undermined the wellbeing of these border communities by prioritizing geopolitical influence and optics. Meanwhile, the lack of a diplomatic relationship between the Maduro and Duque governments, despite sharing a 1,300 mile-long border, means that there are no formal channels through which the two countries can resolve border conflicts. For this reason, following a series of armed confrontations in the Venezuelan state of Apure in March 2021, a group of Colombian and Venezuelan NGOs issued a letter urging the UN Secretary General to designate a Special Envoy to support efforts to deescalate tensions along the border.

Overall, these dynamics, interests, and the state’s security approach to conflict in Arauca victimized the civilian population for decades. As Lopez put it, “if militarization were the answer, we would have already seen a solution.”

A Security Situation Foreshadowed

The current violence in Arauca was foreshadowed, according to Juan Carlos Villate—an Araucan Ombudsman for Tame municipality. The 2016 peace accord signed between the Colombian state and the FARC sparked hopes for peace throughout the country, prominently so in Arauca. In tandem with dialogues that were occurring with the ELN in the mid-2010s, these peacebuilding advances brought about a respite from violence for communities across the department. However, this tranquility was short-lived. Villate underscored how the faltering implementation of the 2016 peace accord helped generate the current security situation.

The Colombian government’s failure to comprehensively implement the 2016 peace accord helped triggered the growth of dissident groups that operate in the region. However, it is incorrect to assume that these dissident factions operate in the same ways as the FARC, according to President of Arauca’s Human Rights Protection Committee Guillermo Antonio Díaz Leonis. He explained that the commanders of these splinter groups are not the thousands of individuals that committed themselves to Colombia’s peace by laying down their arms. Communities throughout Arauca recognize that the dissidents are different from the FARC that demobilized. Instead, they are composed of a mix of different armed actors that are financed by the department’s illicit economies and fuel its violence.

A mute institutional and humanitarian response to the evolving composition of armed actors in the region also fostered the current insecurity and violence. The Ombudsman’s Office—which since 2001 has published over 70 different Early Warning alerts, risk reports, and follow-ups—has persistently documented the dynamics among armed actors in the department and warned that clashes between the ELN and dissidents of the FARC were going to arise. Even with this foreshadowing, the state has made no concrete humanitarian plans to ensure protection, leaving the civilian population entrenched in deep insecurity. Ultimately, Villate and Díaz Leonis concluded that Araucans are strong advocates of comprehensively implementing the 2016 peace accord and resuming dialogues with the ELN guerrilla, as they understand the detrimental implications of not following through with these peacebuilding efforts.

Dialogue with the ELN is Crucial for Colombia’s Peace

Luis Eduardo Celis, an expert with the Peace and Reconciliation Foundation, echoed sentiments for a comprehensive peace by making a strong case for the Colombian government to resume national dialogues with the ELN. Celis characterized Arauca as having separate governing states: the Colombian state and the ELN. The guerrilla group has enforced its rule over communities throughout Arauca for over half a century. Residents, as they hold deep fear of repercussions and reprisals, are made to follow the ELN’s rules and norms. While the ELN is responsible for unacceptable atrocities and violence, many Araucan communities also deeply distrust the Colombian state and its institutions, often looking to the ELN to address community needs that should be carried out by the state. It’s a reality that must be acknowledged to truly address the complex situation in Arauca. The state must rethink its relationship with the department, which can only happen through social investment and peacebuilding efforts.

The Need to Prioritize Social Investment

Each panelist at WOLA’s event described the fundamental lack of social investment in Arauca, and how it perpetuates different manifestations of violence.

Adam Isacson, WOLA’s Director for Defense Oversight, spoke of a 2019 trip he took to Arauca with WOLA’s Director for the Andes Gimena Sánchez-Garzoli. He described how despite the profits brought in by the oil industry, they saw how a large portion of the department’s residents live in poverty, as these profits are not invested back into the community for basic infrastructure and services. When roads, bridges, and other forms of infrastructure are built, they are made solely with the oil industry’s interests in mind. Even past U.S. foreign aid, such as under the Bush administration, was directed towards amping up security to protect Arauca’s oil infrastructure, leaving behind social investment for Arauca’s over 300,000 residents. This disregard for the communities and people who make up Arauca must change.

The people of Arauca deserve to advocate for themselves and choose their path to true democracy and peace. Arauca desperately needs to be given the ability to build up its institutions and infrastructure, so that it can govern autonomously, build up its economy, fortify its health systems, form an education system, and offer sustainable opportunities to its people. Right now, they are living with fear and anxiety of what will come with the ongoing internal armed conflict occurring in their department. But their story is also one of hope. Social leaders like Briceño are mobilizing communities to advocate for themselves. They are pleading with the international community to accompany them and urge the Colombian government to advance peace accord implementation and dialogues with the ELN. These communities are the catalysts to peace, and Colombia must invest in them.

Tags: Arauca

January 25, 2022

Report Submitted to Colombia’s Truth Commission Centers the Experiences of Gender-Based Violence Victims During the Internal Armed Conflict

Join Oxfam, the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), and the Latin America Working Group (LAWG) on October 28 at 11:00 a.m. EDT for a webinar about the report. Sign up here:
Colombian Women Speaking Truth to End Violence: Testimonies and Recommendations to Colombia’s Truth Commission under the Peace Accord.

Many women and their organizations across Colombia have come together to document their own experiences with violence during the country’s internal armed conflict, share their testimonies, offer an analysis of the structural roots of violence against women in a patriarchal society, and provide recommendations to ensure such violence does not recur. These efforts resulted in a published report—by Colombian feminist organization Casa de la Mujer, in colloboration with local organizations in Cauca, Córdoba, and Meta departments—entitled “TruthIs: Politicizing Women’s Pain and Emotions.”

These women’s organizations submitted their report to Colombia’s Truth Commission, which was created in the historic 2016 Peace Accord to uncover the truth about human rights violations during the conflict, promote recognition of the victims and the responsibilities of those in the conflict, and foster coexistence in order to ensure such violence is not repeated. The report discusses the importance of politicizing women’s pain and emotions as a means to raise public awareness about the conflict’s violence against women and provide guarantees these harmful acts will not be repeated. It contains chapters dedicated to the Meta, Córdoba, and Cauca departments that outline women’s rights before armed actors arrived, women’s experiences after they arrived, the acts of violence committed against women, women’s emotions and resistance, and the patriarchal logic and practices of violence perpetrated against women.

The report’s recommendations are vital to addressing all forms of violence against women and ensuring a strong gender approach for understanding the conflict and building lasting peace. Therefore, delivering the report to the Truth Commission is important because it highlights the trailblazing gender provisions in the Peace Accord and urges they be used as mechanisms for justice.

The women’s organizations call on the international community to:

Urge the Colombian state to advance the integral implementation of the Peace Accord, in particular with regard to women’s and a gender perspective, demilitarize the response to social protest, and guarantee women’s right to social and political participation;
Support the design and implementation of programs and actions aimed at guaranteeing the non-repetition of acts of violence experienced by women;
Accompany the process of widely distributing the Truth Commission’s final report when it is published in mid-2022;
Consistently follow-up, through international monitoring, on the implementation of the Truth Commission’s recommendations for coexistence and non-repetition;
Support peacebuilding initiatives led by civil society organizations, especially those led by women.

Below you will find an unofficial translation of a summary of the report.

TruthIs: Politicizing Women’s Pain and Emotions

To guarantee acts of violence perpetrated against women are not repeated, it is necessary to carry out initiatives for coexistence, reconciliation, and peacebuilding. These initiatives require the inevitable ethical and political responsibilities of explaining how the violence of Colombia’s internal armed conflict, as well as overarching patriarchal and capitalist ideologies, have caused suffering for women. With these responsibilities in mind, the truth narrated by women must contribute to a recognition by Colombian society that their lives are valuable and that this violence against women is a societal concern. Addressing violence against women at the societal level serves as a step towards healing for women victims of the armed conflict. To politicize the pain and emotions of women is to recognize, understand, and explain the suffering of women; it is accepting that the loss of their lives has not been considered a reason for social or collective mourning, given the unequal distribution of suffering in which women’s pain has not been and is not socially recognized or amplified (Butler, 2006, p. 16).

Therefore, we hope that our report “TruthIs: Politicizing Women’s Pain and Emotions” will contribute to politicizing both the roots of the patriarchy and the socio-political structures in which we live. We also strive to explain why some lives are more protected than others and why some are more exposed to violence and more susceptible to suffering. Additionally, we also explore why some women manage to process and give a collective and political meaning to their pain through forms of resistance. For example, they accompany other women, promote organizing among women, and demand the building of a society where women are equal and have the same opportunities as men, free from violence.

The report contains a prologue that discusses the importance of politicizing women’s pain and emotions as a means to raise public awareness, ensure these harmful acts are not repeated, and build lasting peace. The report’s introduction presents the principles, methodology, purpose, and the conceptual elements that guide the information collection and its subsequent analysis. The report then focuses on three of Colombia’s departments: Meta, Córdoba, and Cauca. Each of these chapters addresses women’s rights before armed actors arrived, women’s experiences after armed actors arrived, the acts of violence committed against women, women’s emotions and resistance, and the patriarchal logic and practices of violence perpetrated against women. Additionally, each chapter includes the most relevant dynamics of the armed conflict that help explain the intersection and intertwining of the violence women experienced.

The last chapter analyzes the patriarchal ideology of violence used against women and its expansion, its continuities and discontinuities, and its displacement from private life to the public realm and from the public realm to the private sphere. It includes the practices, stereotypes, and evaluations about women and feminized bodies. The chapter ends with recommendations to Colombia’s Truth Commission to guarantee non-repetition and coexistence.

Women victims from the following groups and regions present recommendations that they hope will contribute to the Truth Commission’s work, and ultimately contribute to responding to the expectations and needs of women victims:

Women from Caldono, Santander de Quilichao, Lorica, Montería, Tierralta, Valencia, and Granada.
The Association of Women of Ariari- Association of Women Building Development for the Region of Ariari Asomuariari
(Asociación De Mujeres Construyendo Desarrollo para la Región del Ariari, Asomuariari).
The Association of Victims of the Internal Armed Conflict of Lorica
(Asociación de Víctimas por el conflicto armado interno de Lorica, Asovilor).
Foundation for Social Development and Agricultural Research
(Fundación para el Desarrollo Social y la Investigación Agrícola, Fundesia).
Network of Social Organizations of Communal and Community Women of Monteria (Red de Organizaciones Sociales de mujeres, Rosmuc).

With regard to interpreting the violent acts against women during the internal armed conflict, we suggest that the Truth Commission:

Take into account the existing relationships among armed conflict, patriarchy, and capitalism, and how these contribute to violence against women; that is, creating cartographies that demonstrate the intersection of structural violence with the violence experienced by women because they are women, in all their diverse identities;
Recognize that violence against women is fundamental to the mapping of geographies of power, control, and masculinized “disciplining” of women’s bodies and territories;
Highlight the importance of deconstructing the patriarchal and capitalist ideologies that place women’s lives in a place of precariousness that is exacerbated within a scenario of armed confrontation;
Recognize women as holders of rights, in all their diverse identities; implying that the recommendations should ensure that the state guarantee enabling conditions for the effective enjoyment of rights for all women, without any distinction whatsoever. Additionally, it means changing the perspective that all women have the same needs, instead understanding that women victims have individual experiences and rights, allowing them to demand that the state comply with its constitutional and internationally recognized responsibilities.

In order to politicize women’s pain and emotions, we suggest the Truth Commission give a privileged place in its report for women’s pain and emotions. Such pain and emotions are linked to the ruthless exercise of power by men—armed and unarmed—over women, the violence against them, and the dispute over their bodies, their territory.

Therefore, we suggest the Truth Commission urge the Colombian state to:

Design and agree on national and territorial plans for the psychosocial accompaniment of victims by women’s and victims’ organizations and provide the needed economic and professional resources. Plans should emphasize strategies that focus on women’s pain and care for the body, promoting reflection on the deprivatization of pain, self-care, self-esteem, and autonomy in all their diverse identities. The national and territorial plans should include ancestral knowledge and practices of care and self-care;
Design, coordinate, and implement communication, cultural, and educational strategies that transform images and stereotypes that uplift the value, life, and dignity of women in all their diverse identities;
Build monuments and public parks to honor the memory of women victims and declare sites linked to the violence committed against women during the armed conflict as spaces of memory (after putting together an inventory of sites in consultation with women’s organizations);
Recognize the responsibility of the state, armed actors, and civil society organizations in the territories for the violence committed against women and for the pain caused because they did nothing to stop, denounce, investigate, and punish this violence. They failed to protect women;
Apologize to the victims of sexual violence, especially women and girls, and other people of different sexual orientations and different gender identities for the grave violations committed against them.

In regard to guarantees for non-repetition and reconciliation, we suggest the Colombian Truth Commission:

Immediately comply with the Peace Accord and, in particular, with measures focused on women’s rights and a gender perspective;
Design and implement programs and actions that help guarantee non-repetition. They should aim to recognize the experiences and authority of women, as well as remove the structural causes of oppression and subordination, injustices and exclusions, and the violence women experience in public and private spheres;
Give full support and legitimacy to the work of individuals, institutions, and organizations that defend women’s human rights, feminist organizations, and victims’ organizations;
Provide support to collective memory initiatives proposed by local institutions, women’s organizations, and communities affected by severe violations of women’s human rights—in all their diverse identities—and international humanitarian law;
Design, coordinate, and implement, in public and private educational centers, a pedagogy for reconciliation based on the recognition of and respect for otherness, dialogue as an option for dealing with public and private conflicts, solidarity and cooperation, as well as the need to legitimize and grant authority to the experience of women in all their diverse identities. The construction of peace and reconciliation requires the transformation of social norms and the material and symbolic elements that reproduce war, discrimination, and privileges for political, economic, social, ethnic, and sexual reasons;
Guarantee the equal participation of women in all their diverse identities in the mechanisms adopted to follow up on the implementation of the Truth Commission’s recommendations.

We call upon the international community to:

Urge the Colombian state to advance the integral implementation of the Peace Accord, in particular with regard to women’s rights and a gender perspective, demilitarize the response to social protest, and guarantee women’s right to social and political participation.
Support the design and implementation of programs and actions aimed at guaranteeing the non-repetition of acts of violence experienced by women;
Accompany the process of widely distributing the Truth Commission’s final report when it is published in mid-2022.
Consistently follow-up, through international monitoring, on the implementation of the Truth Commission’s recommendations for coexistence and non-repetition.
Support peacebuilding initiatives led by civil society organizations, especially those led by women.

Tags: Gender Perspective, Transitional Justice

October 25, 2021

U.S. Congress Representatives Acknowledge Peace Hasn’t Reached Indigenous Communities in Colombia

On November 20, the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the U.S. Congress convened a hearing to discuss how the United States can leverage its role in Latin America and in multilateral institutions to protect the lives and culture of Indigenous people in the Americas. The hearing centered on many countries in the region and several speakers focused on issues specific to Colombia and its peace process. Congress representatives Jim McGovern, Deb Haaland, Christopher Smith, Hank Johnson, Sheila Jackson Lee, and Raul Grijalva led the event. Keith Slack, Director of Strategic Impact and Campaigns at EarthRights, provided an in-depth overview about violence against Indigenous groups in Colombia.

In Colombia, over 242 Indigenous leaders have been assassinated since the signing of the 2016 peace accords, including over 47 killed between January and June 2020. In their opening remarks, Representative Smith stressed how these assassinations often occur because Indigenous communities in Latin America are exploited for profitable gain and are further undercut by the lack of protection from their governments. Representative Haaland called attention to the Colombian government’s protection efforts for Indigenous leaders, but as evidenced by continued attacks against these leaders, concerted follow-up actions are rarely upheld. Representative Johnson revealed he has traveled to Colombia on several occasions and further documented that the rights of Indigenous communities in Colombia are sidelined. Racial discrimination is an underlying factor as to why these communities are recurrently exploited. Representative Jackson Lee also expressed concern at the lack of human resources dedicated for Indigenous people to protect their land, and ultimately stated that the rights of Indigenous people are human rights.

On behalf of non-governmental organization Amazon Watch, Leila Salazar-Lopez provided recommendations to protect Indigenous communities in the Amazon region. Over 73,000 Indigenous people throughout the multistate region have been killed by the COVID-19 disease, many who are elders and holders of cultural knowledge. Despite these distressing circumstances caused by the pandemic, agribusiness expansion and land grabbing has accelerated, as a result of illegal arson empowered by complicit government enablement and systemic racism. Salazar-Lopez called for a multi-year moratorium for any destruction; the strengthening of local and multilateral environmental agencies, so strategies from both Indigenous peoples and scientists inform policies implemented by governments; the endorsement of the Amazon Climate platform, to support ecosystem restoration efforts and Indigenous land rights; and the protection of environmental defenders.

Melania Canales Poma, President of the National Organization of Andean and Amazonian Women of Peru, spoke on collective and individual rights for Indigenous people in the region. The extractivist policies of mining and agriculture when intersected with gender and Indigenous communities further deprive Indigenous women of their agency. Indigenous women must be included in all facets of the policy change process. Additionally, Policy Director of the Bank Information Center Jolie Schwarz discussed the weak state of multilateral accountability. In Colombia, Schwarz noted how the World Bank approved an $8 billion loan in 2016 following ratification of the peace accord. The loan was supposed to support territorial planning commitments but failed to consult with Indigenous people. These communities were entirely removed from the planning process. For these reasons, Schwarz recommends that the United States and the international community protect Indigenous rights in all aspects of development projects, provide rigorous assessments of the impact on Indigenous communities throughout a project, and outline clear procedures for raising concerns over potential violations of Indigenous sovereignty.

Violence against Indigenous groups in Colombia has become acute during the pandemic. Keith Slack described the situation as a “potential ethnocide,” acknowledging the land grabbing role of corporations, drug cartels, and paramilitary groups that advance the destruction of Indigenous cultures. The mass murder of Indigenous people occurs every day in Colombia and has become worse with COVID-19 lockdowns that prevent Indigenous leaders from changing location, a key protection strategy. Slack stressed there needs to be respect for Indigenous sustainability and the right to refuse the exploitation of land without fear of retaliation. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is set to hear the case of Indigenous violations, and a successful outcome will set an important precedent. Recommendations to the incoming Biden administration include ensuring that human rights protection bodies are responding accordingly to violations; establishing transformational partnerships between governments, the private sector, civil society, and Indigenous peoples; implementing comprehensive global guidelines through the State Department for adequate protection of at-risk human rights defenders; and pushing Congress to adopt further legislation for corporate responsibility in grave human rights abuses in the region.

Indigenous communities throughout Latin America continue to greatly contribute to food security, environmental protection, and conflict resolution. However, they are in crisis and the hearing urged for the creation of a working group on Indigenous peoples. Brian Keane, a former USAID advisor on Indigenous People’s Issues for U.S. Foreign Assistance, provided several recommendations for the Biden administration. It needs to continue reforming U.S. foreign assistance. There needs to be model that respects Indigenous sovereignty because they are not passive participants of development, but rather active catalysts that move their interests forward. Traditional knowledge and their sustainable practices are key in promoting viable living structures and must be included in the development process. Keane also proposed that a Native American representative should fill the Secretary of the Interior position. The Biden administration must ensure full implementation of USAID’s policies on promoting the rights of Indigenous people and ensure that these policies are also enforced in large infrastructure projects. The United States needs to reengage in multilateral efforts to protect human rights, which includes supporting the work of the UN with Indigenous groups and placing them at the forefront of the UN Security Council.

Ultimately, the United States must repair its relationship with Indigenous groups, who have been neglected by the Trump administration. In Colombia, this relationship is strengthened by supporting the full implementation of the 2016 peace accord.

Tags: Human Rights Defenders, Indigenous Communities, U.S. Congress

December 1, 2020

LGBT+ Groups Provide Evidence to the Special Jurisdiction for Peace About Prejudice-Based Abuses Committed Against Them During Colombia’s Armed Conflict

(Photo from the Special Jurisdiction for Peace)

On September 15, Caribe Afrimativo presented to the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (Jursidicción Especial para la Paz, JEP) a report detailing how the Colombian armed conflict’s violence targeted lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT+) people. Submitted by the organizations Casa Diversa Comuna 8 in Medellín and the Crisálida Collective in San Rafael, with the support of Lawyers Without Borders Canada and Global Affairs Canada, this historic report establishes that conflict-related violence by state forces and paramilitary groups targeted LGBT+ groups.

Titled What We Lost (Lo que perdimos), the report submitted to the tribunal demonstrates how members of LGBT+ groups were targeted on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, and/or gender expression. The acts of prejudice-based violence identified in the report’s private testimonies establish how systematic attacks against LGBT+ groups were committed to achieve territorial and social control during the conflict. State forces and paramilitary groups threatened, humiliated, arbitrarily detained, forcibly displaced, sexually abused, and assassinated members of the groups in attempts to achieve military advantage in the conflict. Through either direct participation in the grave abuses or tacit complicity in cases committed by paramilitary groups, state forces played a decisive role in this persecution – a crime against humanity.

Private testimonies recount how LGBT+ community members resorted to travelling in groups to protect themselves from constant abuses. In Comuna 8, testimonies uncover how three social leaders from Casa Diversa were forcibly displaced, causing many other members to abandon the group and the area in fear of their lives. Other abuses at the hands of the Cacique Nutibara bloc of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, AUC), in collusion with the Army’s Fourth Brigade, occurred between 1997 and 2008. In San Rafael, the Metro Bloc of the AUC assassinated the Crisálida Collective’s leader and acted in collusion with state forces between 1997 and 2001. Collected with the help of Caribe Afirmativo since 2018, the testimonies will help the JEP hold perpetrators accountable.

Caribe Afirmativo continues to work to amplify the voices of victims and their communities in Colombia’s transitional justice system. The organization presented a report to the Truth Commission, along with numerous technical documents that record the experiences of LGBT+ victims in Colombia’s armed conflict. Previous reports submitted by Caribe Afirmativo to the JEP focus on conflict-related violence against LGBT+ people. However, the testimonies in this latest report are unique because they provide evidence on how state forces and paramilitary groups targeted the leaders of locally based LGBT+ groups, who promote fundamental rights, democratic ideals, and peace, to permanently exterminate their presence in civil society. Therefore, this is the first report submitted to the JEP that reveals how LGBT+ groups, not only LGBT+ individuals, were subject to conflict-related violence.

The transitional justice system provides a key pathway for victims to seek truth, justice, and establish memory. It allows victims to get back what was taken from them: visibility, full exercise of their rights, and peace. As indicated by JEP Judge Reinere Jaramillo, the report “activates memory in a country where violence still persists.” Colombia remains one of the most dangerous countries in Latin America for the LGBT+ community, despite progressive legislation and visibility. According to Colombia’s Ombudsman Office, just in 2020 thus far, over 60 LGBT+ persons have been killed. With this alarming statistic in mind, it is crucial to support the efforts of organizations and mechanisms working to understand the legacies of the past to ensure Colombia’s LGBT+ community is able to live in peace in a post-conflict setting.

A Spanish-language executive summary of the Lo que perdimos report is available here.

Tags: LGBT+, Special Jurisdiction for Peace

September 30, 2020

Over 1,000 Organizations and Activists Back the UN Human Rights Office in Colombia

On February 26, the Colombian Government publicly condemned the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’ (OHCHR) 2019 Report. The condemnation characterized the report as imprecise and untruthful—and President Iván Duque went as far as saying that one of the report’s recommendations was an “infringement of sovereignty.” Many civil society actors—over 1,000 organizations and activists—came together in solidarity with the UN Human Rights office to support its significant work. They quickly organized to publish a public declaration. Here is an English translation:

WE SUPPORT THE OFFICE OF THE HIGH COMMISSIONER OF THE UNITED NATIONS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN COLOMBIA’S WORK AND ITS REPRESENTATIVE ALBERTO BRUNORI

Bogotá, March 2, 2020

Since the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’ (OHCHR) arrival in Colombia in 1997, the social and human rights movements have supported its work and its reports that annually summarize major events related to socio-political violence in the context of armed conflict, to humanitarian issues, and to the situation of human rights and international humanitarian law in general. Its recommendations have been a valuable and permanent tool for national and international advocacy, as well as a useful document for a better understanding of our reality.

This week, OHCHR’s representative in Colombia, Mr. Alberto Brunori, published the 2019 Report, which we support and consider appropriate, serious, rigorous, and in accordance with Colombia’s human rights reality. This report coincides with the reality that, on a daily basis, is seen through social media and complaints brought by social organizations throughout different territories in the country. The quantitative and qualitative description it contains gives an account of the country’s recent exponential deterioration in human rights.

We consider Iván Duque and the National Government’s reaction to both the report and to the work conducted by the OHCHR under Representative Brunori undue and unjustified. This disproportionate reaction demonstrates the Government’s lack of commitment to human rights at the international level with bodies that – like the Office – constructively contribute to the validity of the human rights situation in our country.

Social and human rights platforms and organizations support the judicious and documented work of Mr. Alberto Brunori and his national and regional work teams, and welcome his stay in the country until 2022. We urge the National Government to address the recommendations contained in the Report, as this will help address the growing violence in the country, and will take truly effective measures to ensure the human rights of the population. This will also ensure the success of the Peace Agreement, considered by the international community to be unprecedented and of global interest.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights office in Colombia will continue to count on our support to continue contributing significantly to the prevalence of coexistence and the pursuit of peace in Colombia through its observation mandate, technical assistance, and verification of the Peace Agreement’s implementation.

(Letter in Spanish with list of signers)

Tags: Human Rights, UN

March 4, 2020