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On November 7, Colombia will undergo the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) to evaluate whether or not the human rights recommendations formulated in the previous 2018 control by the UN have been applied. The balance is quite bleak, according to the analysis of the international advocacy lawyer of the Colombian Commission of Jurists Camila Zuluaga.
“Colombia is one of the most dangerous countries to defend human rights; the lack of investigation results in the high figures of impunity for these crimes continuing, the institutions created by the 2016 Peace Agreement, such as the Unidad Special Investigation of the Prosecutor’s Office, which are directed to investigate these crimes, are not operating with the speed and effectiveness that is expected,” laments Camila Zuluaga, who has met in France with figures from the Government of President Macron and the Assembly and Senate to report on the evaluation of these five years on the Universal Periodic Review.
It is a mechanism that the UN uses for United Nations member states to review the human rights situation of a country. This review is carried out every five years and takes stock of what the country in question has or has not accomplished.
According to figures collected to examine Colombia, between 2018 and March 2023, 716 human rights defenders. H H. They have been murdered and 216 attacked. Most of these attacks and murders, 95%, go unpunished. And, despite the Peace Agreements, armed groups continue to exist in Colombia: FARC dissidents, active guerrillas and a range of criminal groups linked to drug trafficking.
The failures of the National Protection Unit
What’s more, according to Zuluaga, those in charge of protecting human rights defenders. H H. They become his aggressors. It is not a majority phenomenon, but it exists. “There are officials of the National Protection Unit who in some cases persecute and harass defenders,” denounces the jurist who affirms that the structure has many other flaws.
“Protection measures are granted that do not correspond to the needs of the population. For example, bulletproof vests or armored cars or an escort are provided and they do not take into account, for example, differentiated gender measures in the case of women defenders, in the case of territories, let’s say that are much more rural, measures that are not only physical,” he adds.
3,000 murders of women between 2018 and 2022
Other figures are increasing, according to those collected by the National Institute of Legal Medicine and Medical-Legal Sciences of Colombia: 30,436 women were victims of sexist violence in 2021, almost 4,000 more than the previous year.
“The confinement and the Covid-19 pandemic caused women to remain with their attackers 24 hours a day. And the response of the institutions to the complaints has been insufficient. Between 2018 and 2022 we registered more than 3,000 femicides in Colombia. This shows how alarming the situation is in this matter,” explains Camila Zuluaga.
More than 7,000 sentences to restore 183,000 hectares of land
“Comprehensive rural reform such as the implementation of the Victims and Land Restitution Law of 2021 has been going on for a rather long period with few results. We have documented more than 7,000 sentences that have restored nearly 183,000 hectares. However, the The overall number of hectares dispossessed in Colombia is 6 million, that is, the percentage of restitution is very low,” laments the jurist.
For Zuluaga there are many barriers that prevent victims from satisfying their right to reparation quickly, these are both administrative, judicial and resource barriers. “There is a judicial congestion that also causes reparation sentences such as land restitution to be delayed,” he explains in Escala in Paris.
Within the framework of the Peace Process, the report highlights that the JEP, Special Jurisdiction for Peace, has opened ten macro cases, but those most responsible are not being tried, according to the evaluation.
“The new sentences or the first sentences of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace are approaching and the most responsible, those mainly responsible for the serious crimes committed against the civilian population are not being prosecuted,” the jurist states with concern.
Recruitments of minors continue
Human rights violations are also committed among the little ones. The report documents 290 violations of the rights of boys and girls in the context of the armed conflict. “130 boys and girls have been forcibly recruited. We have also documented nearly 23 cases of kidnapping and other forms of sexual violence,” says Camila Zuluaga.
The aggressors are not only the armed groups, the jurist points to the responsibility of the Public Force. “From 2018 to 2022, acts have been committed against the population where children are found, bombings of camps or bombings of communities where children remain or live. So they have not been immune to the conflict situation in the country either,” she adds. .
Camila Zuluaga gives Colombia a three on a scale of ten in terms of human rights and is doubtful about President Gustavo Petro’s Total Peace policy.
“We appreciate these initiatives of conversation and negotiation and submission to Justice, but we have several doubts about how it will be implemented. There is no will or resources to implement the 2016 Peace Agreement signed with the FARC. What is going on? What will happen with the transitional justice mechanisms that exist at this moment? How are these new negotiations going to operate so that they work in parallel with this justice system?” the expert asks.
Camila Zuluaga is also a spokesperson for the Colombian human rights platforms Coordination Colombia Europe United States, the Alliance of Social and Related Organizations and the Colombian Platform for Human Rights, Democracy and Development, which together with more than 500 organizations have presented the report within the framework of the UPR with the support of the France Colombia Solidarities network, a member of Vamos por la paz and the International Human Rights Office Action: Colombia.
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