Advocate Articles

“The only way to change the nation’s destiny is to help the victims tell their story.” —Colombian journalist Hollman Morris.

On February 4, 2008, Colombians marched in the millions in a powerful rejection of violence by the FARC guerrillas. It was an inspirational, authentic cry by Colombians weary of the horrific guerrilla tactics, and a show of solidarity for the suffering of the many Colombians held for years as captives of the FARC. While the march was a citizens’ effort, the government supported it enthusiastically, and President Álvaro Uribe offered “our voice of gratitude to all the Colombians who today expressed with dignity and strength a rejection of kidnapping and kidnappers.”

For many of the victims of paramilitary violence, the march’s enormous scale raised the question of why the same Colombian society that stood so united behind the victims of the FARC would fail to stand behind them. Why did so few seem to care about the families of the thousands of people who had been killed or disappeared by the paramilitaries, about the mass graves in the countryside, about the bodies that washed up on the banks of the rivers, or about the several million people forced to flee their homes, many by paramilitary violence? Why would the government lend support and credibility to this march, but remain mute about paramilitary crimes?  Victims called for a second march a month later, to reject the violence by paramilitaries, as well as the actions of the soldiers and politicians who had supported them. As movement leader Iván Cepeda explained, victims wanted Colombian society to “offer a just homage to the displaced, the disappeared, the families of those assassinated or massacred… We don’t want just a moment of remembrance, we want solidarity.” Yet Colombian society was divided about participating, the government held this march at arms length, and march organizers faced a wave of death threats and violence.

The tale of the two marches helps to explain why a process that demobilized thousands of paramilitaries, members of a murderous armed group, would be so controversial. The victims, after an astounding period of violence, expect and demand not only an end to violence, but some tangible measure of truth, justice and reparations. But the victims of paramilitary violence are still waiting for the acknowledgment they long for, from the government and Colombian society:  to recognize what they suffered,  to admit the role of government officials, politicians and members of Colombia’s armed forces in aiding and abetting paramilitary atrocities, and to say: “Never again.” There is a palpable fear that on some level the demobilization is a sham—with groups that never really demobilized, others rearming, and paramilitary power maintaining a lockhold over national politics and local communities. 

LAWGEF’s new report, The Other Half of the Truth, explores the limited opportunities for truth, justice and reparations available to victims of paramilitary violence through the official process established by the Colombian government.  It takes the story up to the recent roadblock created by the controversial decision by the U.S. and Colombian governments to extradite the top paramilitary leadership to the United States on drug trafficking charges—a move that greatly complicates efforts to try them on human rights charges. Then the report highlights the often heroic efforts by diverse actors—human rights activists, journalists, prosecutors, Supreme Court judges, a few politicians, and especially victims—to wring, if not yet reparations and justice, at least a little more truth from the process. 

For the limits to the truth offered by the official framework began to unravel as many different actors in Colombia tugged at truth as if at a tightly wound ball of yarn. Some one hundred and twenty-five thousand people attempted to register with government agencies as victims.  Victims groups, many vociferously denouncing the official process, began to carry out their own truth sessions, mock trials and alternative registries of stolen land. Human rights groups assailed the obstacles to achieving justice through the demobilization law, and redoubled their efforts to document new abuses by the military and the rearming of paramilitary groups. Journalists published investigative stories and thoughtful opinion columns that sparked public debate on a subject long shrouded in silence. Colombia’s highest courts pried open the door to more justice than contemplated by the executive by setting some minimum standards for application of the demobilization law and hauling the politicians behind the paramilitaries into court. By the end of 2007, Semana columnist María Teresa Ronderos could say, “Like rabbits out of a magician’s hat came the names of businessmen, military and other accomplices of the paramilitary barbarie…. The truth that emerged this year has been sufficiently enlightening… that this year can pass down in history as the one in which we began to discover the truth.” These heroic individuals’ quest for the truth is an unfinished story, but it is an inspirational tale.

The report concludes with recommendations for how U.S. policy can best support the struggle for truth, justice and reparations in Colombia.

See La Cara Oculta, the Spanish version of the report.

The Bush Administration attempts a return to “business as usual” on U.S. Colombia policy this year. We can stop this!

At the end of February, Senators Dodd (D-CT) and Feingold (D-WI) sent a “dear colleague” letter to Secretary of State Rice expressing concern over the increase in civilian killings by the Colombian Army in recent years. Visit www.lawg.org to read the letter and to see if your senators signed it. Many thanks to everyone who called in and wrote emails to their senators—sending a strong human rights message to Secretary Rice would not have been possible without a collective effort!

In its final foreign aid request, the Bush Administration has sought to reverse the positive new direction in aid to Colombia by returning to the same failed approaches of the past. If the request became law, funding for the military would again make up nearly 80 percent of U.S. aid to Colombia, while support for institutions responsible for investigating human rights abuses would be cut. Visit www.cipcol.org to learn more. As long as members of Congress continue to hear from you, we are confident the administration can be beaten back.

While this “back to the future” approach is not likely to find much support in the Congress, this is no time for us to rest. In mid-March, President Bush called approval of the U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement “pivotal to America’s national security” and news reports are suggesting the administration may introduce the agreement in Congress at any moment. When this happens, we must be ready to tell our representatives to vote NO on the U.S.-Colombia FTA—and we’ll have to make sure they hear us loud and clear. Please check www.lawg.org for more information and suggestions for taking action once the FTA is sent to Congress.

Finally, we want to alert you to the threats our partners in Colombia have received in recent weeks. As many of you already know, following the early February marches against the FARC’s continued human rights abuses, particularly the terrible practice of kidnapping, the National Movement for Victims of State Crimes organized a March 6th protest to call attention to Colombia’s victims of paramilitary violence and to condemn acts of violence by all actors. In the days leading up to the protest, a close advisor to President Uribe went on national radio to suggest that the March 6th organizers rally was convened by FARC. Since these reckless comments were made, several of our partners have received email death threats.

We will continue to do all we can to denounce human rights abuses by all actors in Colombia. We are working with members of Congress and the State Department to ensure our Colombian partners who speak out and work for human rights are neither threatened nor harmed. To learn what you can do to help protect human rights defenders in Colombia, visit our website at www.lawg.org.

The woman told me that Colombian soldiers had come and taken her husband from her house. Then they had tortured her husband all night in the field outside her house, close by. She and her children could hear the screams while the soldiers kept them barricaded inside. Finally, in the morning, it was over. The soldiers came and borrowed her broom to clean up the scene of the crime.

The young man, trembling, said the soldiers came into his house and took his father. They tied his hands and feet and sat him down in a chair. Then they killed him in front of the whole family.

The four young people, exhausted and crying, told me how their father had been taken from their home by hooded men. He was accused of being a guerrilla leader, but instead of being just detained, he was killed in captivity. The army said he was killed in combat. The young people traveled all over the province looking for him. When they finally found the cemetery where he was supposed to be buried, they had to dig him up themselves. They were scared. Now they were marked as children of a guerrilla leader in a militarized zone with no rule of law.

The woman told me her son had witnessed a soldier killing someone in their small rural community. Then her son, accompanied by her husband, went to testify about this in front of a military lawyer or judge who was located in the military base. Later, her son and husband were killed—according to the woman, again by soldiers.

These were the stories I heard, again and again, as I participated in an international observation mission on killings of civilians by the Colombian army. A coalition of Colombian human rights groups, led by Coordinación Colombia Europa Estados Unidos, arranged for us in October, in Bogotá, Antioquia and Valledupar, to hear witnesses and family members in over 130 cases of killings of civilians by the Colombian army.

Many of the cases involved people who were detained in their homes or workplaces by soldiers, often groups of soldiers. The families then went looking for them, asking at the military base. They were told, “We don’t have your family member, but here is this guerrilla killed in combat.” The body would be dressed in guerrilla clothing, often presented with a gun and transistor radio. The family members said their relative was taken away in civilian clothing.

Our observer mission found that most of these cases remain in the military justice system, where they go nowhere. By Colombian law, human rights violations, as opposed to disciplinary violations, should be investigated by civilian justice agencies and tried in civilian courts. There was some limited progress in moving these cases to the civilian system, but not much, and very few resulted in convictions. But most disturbingly, these incidents are increasing in number. See a joint memo on extrajudicial killings by LAWGEF, USOC, WOLA, CIP, and Coordinacion.

After listening to the witnesses, we met with high-level government officials from the justice system and Ministry of Defense. We then held a press conference in Bogotá for the press and diplomatic community.

The following week, working with the U.S. Office on Colombia and the Washington Office on Latin America, we brought two of the Colombian human rights lawyers who had organized the mission to talk to policymakers in Washington. We met with the State Department and key committees in Congress, as well as the press. Partly as a result of these concerns, Congress decided to continue its hold on $55 million in military aid. This is the aid from 2006 that is subject to the human rights conditions in law; the State Department has not yet certified that Colombia meets the human rights conditions for 2007. This means, as Colombian daily El Tiempo put it, that $110 million in U.S. military aid for Colombia is “in the freezer.” While it remains on hold, the State Department and Embassy are obliged to raise with the Colombian government these human rights concerns and ask them to ensure all cases go to civilian courts—and to stop these killings.

Take Action! Ask your representative to stand with Afro-Colombians demanding their rights by co-sponsoring H. Res. 618. To be connected to their office, call the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121. Visit our website at www.lawg.org/countries/colombia/alert_09-12-07.htm to find out if they’re already a co-sponsor of this important resolution.

During the August recess, Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ) introduced House Resolution 618, which recognizes the importance of addressing the plight of Afro-Colombians. Although this resolution is non-binding, it will provide much-needed moral support to a community caught in the crossfire.In Colombia, Afro-descendents are harshly affected daily by extreme poverty and racial discrimination. The statistics are truly astonishing. Although they often live in regions rich in natural wealth, 76% of Afro-Colombians live in extreme poverty. Chocó, the department with the largest Afro-Colombian population, receives the lowest per capita government investment in health, education and infrastructure of any department.

Whether they are “caught in the crossfire” or specifically targeted, Afro-Colombians are often forced to leave their communities and ancestral lands behind. As a result, Afro-Colombians now constitute a disproportionate amount of Colombia’s 3.8 million internally displaced. At a recent event here in Washington, Alba Maria Cuestas Arias, a displaced Afro-Colombian and board member of AFRODES, explained how displacement is used as a weapon of war: “Towns are destroyed, lives are destroyed. The social fabric is also destroyed. People are forced to leave that which they have been constructing for years and years.” Meanwhile, aerial spraying is destroying many of the food crops traditionally grown by Afro-Colombians, leading to further displacement and insecurity.

H. Res. 618 will bring attention to the plight of Afro-Colombians and will show that the U.S. Congress stands behind them. Along with recognizing the Afro-Colombian contributions to Colombian society, the resolution calls on the Colombian government to end racial discrimination and protect Afro-Colombians’ constitutionally guaranteed lands. The resolution also rightly encourages the U.S. and Colombian governments to consult with Afro-Colombian groups when developing policies that will affect them. In the words of Alva Maria Cuestas, “When the government talks about displacement in Chocó, they simply say that either it doesn’t exist or that if it ever existed, it has now been dealt with.” Perhaps Rep. Payne’s resolution will help change this situation by ensuring the voices of Afro-Colombians are heard by policymakers in both countries.

—Benjamin Natkin

Our voices are finally being heard on U.S. policy towards Colombia! In June, a new positive direction for Colombia was approved by the full House of Representatives. With all of your calls to Congress, supporters of the old approach did not have the votes to reinstate military aid and turn back the clock. Just a few weeks after the foreign aid bill was approved, House Resolution 426 on the crisis of internal displacement in Colombia passed the full House by voice vote, with many members of Congress giving impassioned speeches in support. In the Senate, the Appropriations Committee has approved an aid package with increased support for human rights, rural development and humanitarian needs. The Latin America Working Group this year brought together diverse groups to present recommendations for the Congress that helped to turn the tide. But these recent victories reflect our all our collective hard work over the past several years to shift aid for war to aid for development and peace.

Since Plan Colombia began, 80 percent of the annual aid package has gone to the security forces, with only 20 percent going towards social and economic programs. By reducing military aid to 55 percent of the aid package, while simultaneously approving over $100 million more in economic and judicial aid than President Bush requested, the House version of the foreign aid bill marks a very significant shift in the U.S. role in Colombia. Aid is increased for rural development and internally displaced persons. Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities are slated to receive $15 million in development aid, to be used in consultation with these communities.

The aid package aims to strengthen respect for human rights by providing judicial
institutions with the resources they need to investigate abuses and collaboration with
paramilitaries, and includes funding for witness protection as well as to increase victims’ access to justice. Human rights conditions would apply to 40 percent, not just 25 percent, of military aid in the bill.

For several years, proponents of Plan Colombia have claimed that aerial spraying would diminish coca cultivation and thus decrease the availability of cocaine on U.S. streets. However, according to the House report accompanying the bill, “…the perennial goal of reducing Colombia’s cultivation, processing and distribution [of coca] to restrict supplies enough to drive up prices and diminish purity has not worked and the drug economy continues to grow—further weakening the fabric of Colombian society.” Given this failure, the House foreign aid bill sensibly reduces funding for spray planes used to fumigate farms and increases aid for small farmers.

The Senate Appropriations Committee has passed its version of the bill, although the bill won’t go to the Senate floor until September. While the Senate version is not as dramatic a change as in the House, it continues a positive direction in aid to Colombia, increasing aid for rural development and manual eradication. It greatly strengthens aid for the rule of law and for victims, including funding to increase victims’ access to justice and to investigate mass graves.

We can’t rest yet! The final version must be passed by the Senate and approved in the House-Senate conference. See below on how you can take action.

These gains were achieved despite unrelenting pressure from the Colombian government, its many highly-paid lobbyists and the Bush Administration to keep military funding in place and to pry loose approval of the pending U.S.-Colombia free trade agreement. After an unproductive visit to Washington this spring, Colombian President Álvaro Uribe returned after just a few weeks, vowing to win over the Democratic Congress. LAWG joined with the Washington Office on Latin America, labor and human rights groups to organize a press conference during which members of Congress pointed to the targeted killing of 72 trade unionists last year in explaining their opposition to a trade pact with Colombia. Rep. Phil Hare (D-IL), a new member and former union leader, put his concerns bluntly: “If I had been born in Colombia, there is a strong possibility I would not be here with you today. I could be dead.” Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) underscored the impact of the trade agreement on small farmers: “Many farmers will be forced to choose between leaving their farms for crowded factories or growing lucrative drug crops.” New member Betty Sutton (D-OH) and staunch human rights advocate Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) also spoke. Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) delivered the basic message to President Uribe: “He keeps coming back, time and again, because he doesn’t like the message he’s hearing: human rights, human rights, human rights… We want to see real change, real action, not just hear more endless talk.”

Take Action! Contact your senators by early September and urge them to support this new approach in aid to Colombia. Encourage them to provide greater assistance to help Colombia's victims of violence, to strengthen the justice system, to provide real economic alternatives to small farmers, and to cut military aid. We do not expect there to be a specific amendment when the bill goes to the Senate floor in September, but senators should hear what their constituents care about when it comes to aid for Colombia.