Published by WOLA on February 4, 2021
WOLA’s latest urgent update on the situation of human rights defenders and social leaders in Colombia.
February 5, 2021
Published by WOLA on February 4, 2021
WOLA’s latest urgent update on the situation of human rights defenders and social leaders in Colombia.
February 5, 2021
Published by WOLA on December 16, 2020
WOLA’s latest urgent update on the situation of human rights defenders and social leaders in Colombia.
December 16, 2020
Publicado por Vorágine y La Liga Contra el Silencio el 10 de diciembre de 2020.
Tells the story of the proprietor of a beachfront eco-lodge in Nuquí, Chocó, murdered by the Gulf Clan neo-paramilitaries in October 2020.
December 10, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 9 de diciembre de 2020.
Profile of a social leader murdered in 2016, one of a three-part series about the Bajo Cauca region of Antioquia department.
December 9, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 9 de diciembre de 2020.
One of a three-part series about the Bajo Cauca region of Antioquia department.
December 9, 2020
Published by the International Crisis Group on December 2, 2020.
Profiles a social leader, and the dangers she faces, in a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Bogotá.
December 2, 2020
Published by WOLA on November 24, 2020
WOLA’s latest monthly urgent update on the situation of human rights defenders and social leaders in Colombia.
November 25, 2020
Publicado por El Espectador el 14 de noviembre de 2020.
Documents increasing attacks against members of a leftist political movement.
November 14, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 8 de noviembre de 2020.
Part of a four-part series on the security situation, and related human rights and environmental harms, in Guaviare department.
November 8, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 8 de noviembre de 2020.
Part of a four-part series on the security situation, and related human rights and environmental harms, in Guaviare department.
November 8, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 8 de noviembre de 2020.
Part of a four-part series on the security situation, and related human rights and environmental harms, in Guaviare department. A profile of an environmental defender assassinated in 2017.
November 8, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 8 de noviembre de 2020.
Part of a four-part series on the security situation, and related human rights and environmental harms, in Guaviare department.
November 8, 2020
On November 5, the Cooperation Space for Peace, which WOLA forms part of, published a statement to reject the stigmatizing claims against the Humanitarian Caravan to Cañón del Micay in the Cauca department.
Between October 29 and November 2, Campesino, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous communities from Cañón del Micay, a region located between the municipalities of Argelia and El Tambo in the Cauca department, organized a Humanitarian Caravan that sought to raise awareness of and reject the violence experienced by these communities.
However, according to the statement, the work of these social movements and the lives of these individuals are at risk due to the stigmatizing declarations made by Emilio Archila, Presidential Counsellor for Stabilization and Consolidation. He referred to the Caravan’s actions as “pure politicking” from sectors that “use violent acts to continue dividing Colombians.”
The Cooperation Space for Peace notes that the stigmatization of human rights defenders, based on their advocacy work, increases the risk of attacks and violations targeted against them. The statement calls on the State to assume measures to investigate these cases and bring the intellectual and material authors of the incidents, denounced by the Campesino, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous organizations and populations in the region, to justice.
It asks the international community to urge the Colombian government to take comprehensive measures in coordination with the communities to address the structural causes of the humanitarian crisis in the Cauca department, and to urge Colombian government officials to refrain from making defamatory statements that increase the life-threatening risks to social leaders and human rights defenders.
You can find the original, Spanish-language statement here.
An English-language translation of the statement is here.
November 5, 2020
Publicado por Somos Defensores el 3 de noviembre de 2020.
Somos Defensores’ report about attacks on social leaders during the first six months of 2020. The organization counts 95 murders, the largest number it had ever recorded during the first half of a year.
November 3, 2020
Publicado por La Silla Vacía el 22 de octubre de 2020.
The publication verifies, and describes characteristics of, the killings of 222 social leaders between President Iván Duque’s August 2018 inauguration and March 2020.
October 22, 2020
Published by Amnesty International on October 8, 2020.
Finds that failures to implement the peace accord are endangering the lives of human rights defenders.
October 8, 2020
Published by the International Crisis Group on October 6, 2020.
Documenting the causes of attacks on social leaders in post-conflict Colombia, and necessary steps for their protection.
October 6, 2020
Published by the United Nations on September 25, 2020.
A wide-ranging quarterly report about the state of accord implementation, from the UN Verification Mission in Colombia. (Link at undocs.org)
September 25, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 18 de septiembre de 2020.
Social leaders are also under attack in the poor and working-class neighborhoods of Bogotá.
September 18, 2020
Publicado por Verdad Abierta el 4 de agosto de 2020.
Social leader killings have exploded in Caquetá, and few even get investigated.
August 4, 2020
Published by the Fiscalía General de la Nación in August 2020.
An overview of the chief prosecutor’s office’s efforts to bring to justice killers of social leaders and human rights defenders.
August 1, 2020
By Gimena Sánchez-Garzoli and Mario Moreno
This past July, in a powerful show of force, 94 members of the United States House of Representatives sent a letter to Secretary of State Michael Pompeo outlining grave concerns about the status of Colombia’s peace process.
The letter’s message, and the sheer number of signatories on it, sent shockwaves through Colombia. Shortly thereafter, in an interview in The Hill, Colombian President Iván Duque responded to congressional alarm by dismissing it as a product of U.S. electoral politics. His cavalier response underscored the point of the letter: Colombia’s peace is disintegrating because the Duque administration is failing to protect those working to sustain it.
The social leaders, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous activists, and human rights defenders doing the grassroots work of building peace in Colombia’s marginalized communities are being systematically targeted and assassinated. More than 400 social leaders have been killed since the signing of the peace accords, including 170 so far this year according to Colombian NGO Indepaz. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, whose data the Colombian government prefers, has identified a lower number of social leaders killed this year—but pending deaths that need verification, it notes a potential 70 percent increase in murders in the first half of 2020 compared to the first half of 2019.
Among those killed this year is Marco Rivadeneira. He was assassinated while promoting voluntary coca substitutions programs—a key facet of the peace accords and a shared goal of the United States and Colombia—in a community meeting. His relentless efforts to implement these programs in Putumayo, a region where cocaine trafficking groups dominate, earned him credible death threats. He requested help from Colombia’s National Protection Unit, an agency that protects threatened social leaders. He never received it.
Four months after Marco Rivadeneira’s murder, no one has been brought to justice. What’s more, the Duque administration has engaged in policies that undermine Mr. Rivadeneira’s work. Rather than protect and support the 99,097 Colombian families who have signed up for voluntary coca substitution programs, the Duque administration is trying to restart an ineffective aerial eradication program that could decimate the health and sustenance of entire communities. Many of these communities are earnestly interested in voluntary eradication, but live without basic services.
Marco Rivadeneira’s story is a microcosm of peace in Colombia today.
Social leaders are pushing for voluntary coca substitution programs in regions controlled by cocaine traffickers. They’re seeking land, labor, and environmental rights in communities where extractive industries like mining operate. They’re finding justice for the millions of human rights abuses committed during Colombia’s 52-year conflict. Every day, their work directly challenges the power of violent interests in Colombia.
The Duque administration can support the work of social leaders by prioritizing the full implementation of the 2016 peace deal. It can better protect them by bringing those responsible for ordering attacks against social leaders to justice. Instead, the Duque administration is undermining them.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, threatened social leaders have reported that their government-provided protective details have withdrawn, leaving them exposed to credible danger. Last year, the Colombian Attorney General’s Office launched 753 active investigations into threats against social leaders; only three resulted in convictions.
The Duque administration has also made social leaders’ work more difficult. Institutions tasked with uncovering human rights abuses during the Colombian conflict and guiding the truth and reconciliation process face drastic budget cuts. A critical development vehicle designed in conjunction with impacted communities—called Development Plans with a Territorial Focus—is operating at a fraction of its cost.
The reality on the ground is clear: since signing its historic peace accords, Colombia’s grasp on peace has never felt so tenuous.
The 94 members of Congress who signed the letter to Secretary Pompeo expressed legitimate alarm about peace in Colombia. The U.S. House of Representatives was right to act on that concern by generously funding peace implementation in the 2021 Foreign Operations appropriation, and by including amendments in the National Defense Authorization Act to defund aerial fumigation operations in Colombia and investigate reports of illegal surveillance by Colombian military forces.
It is critical that the United States Congress take a further step. It must proactively work with the Colombian government to aggressively protect social leaders, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous activists, and human rights defenders. Without their grassroots work securing land reform, labor rights, environmental rights, and justice, peace in Colombia is not possible.
July 31, 2020
Publicado por Semana el 30 de julio de 2020.
Social leaders discuss this year’s increase in killings.
July 30, 2020
Publicado por Indepaz el 15 de julio de 2020.
The Bogotá-based think tank counts 166 social leaders and 36 former FARC combatants murdered so far in 2020.
July 15, 2020