By: Francisca De Castro, Junior Research Associate, PILPG-NL
Since the 1960s, Colombia has been faced with a situation of armed violence that has plunged the country in insecurity and crisis. Groups of farmers had created self-defense militias, which later turned into guerrilla groups, over agrarian disputes with the government. The violence turned into a conflict between state forces, paramilitary groups, and guerrilla groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC), amongst others. In 2016, the Colombian government and the FARC signed a peace agreement which put an end to more than 60 years of civil war. However, three years later, the humanitarian reality in Colombia is still far from resolved. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reported that the humanitarian situation in Colombia had in fact decayed in 2018. According to the ICRC, this was a consequence of the five remaining armed conflicts with other groups that were running in parallel, and the ineffective state response to these conflicts in certain rural communities, such asthe Catatumbo and the Cauca regions.
The Colombian state’s inaction prompted social leaders, a term generally adopted in Colombian government and civil society to refer to people who are advocating for their communities social/civil rights, to proactively voice the concerns of minorities. However, as a result, these leaders have become targets of aggression from unknown actors. Reports suggest that these aggressions went from 82 recorded aggressions in 2008 to 174 in 2009, and have increased since then. According to the NGO Somos Defensores, in 2018 alone, over 155 social leaders were assassinated. However, the government has not been passive during this situation. It has established protection measures for social leaders which include private security officers as well as protected vehicles.
The “Humanitarian Reality in Colombia” conference organized by Citizen Diplomacy (a group of Colombians living in the Netherlands and working towards bringing attention to the situation of social leaders in Colombia), provided a platform for social leaders visiting Europe to have an opportunity to share their stories.
The first speaker was Nubia Russi, a leader from Tolima who has benefited from the security measures provided by the government. Although grateful for the initiative, she pointed out several flaws in the system. Amongst those are the inequality of access to protective measures, as well as obstacles brought on by these measures, such as the difficulty of finding employment while being accompanied by officers. She elaborated on how the budget of these measures could be better utilized to facilitate educational training for the beneficiaries.
The second leader was Carlos Paez of the Tierra y Paz Organization. Originally displaced from his land in Urabá in the 1990s, he has been fighting to regain access for over a decade. This is a fight that has been affected by several laws, passed in 2007, 2009, and 2011, which claimed that any person forcibly displaced from their lands due to paramilitary activity had the right to regain access. Yet Carlos is one of the few, as less than 10% of the regions’ displaced families have been able to return to their lands.
Lastly, two leaders from the organization Movimientos Rios Vivos, Genaro Graciano and Milena Florez, explained what their lives have looked like since the 2018 Hidroituango catastrophe in which a poorly constructed dam suffered structural defects which resulted in the flooding of several communities in the area, resulting in over 120 people severely affected. They seek reparations for the harm suffered by the communities inhabiting the affected areas, and call for independent investigations to assess liability for these harms.
Citizen Diplomacy has put forward a four-pronged proposal to protect and enhance the lives of these social leaders. It calls for decompression, empowerment, safe return, and creating safe spaces.
The decompression component addresses how social leaders live under constant pressure and fear for their lives. It aims to transport social leaders from high pressure to low pressure environments (often international destinations) for a short amount of time. This would, hopefully, be complemented with familial company and emotional support.
The empowerment component stems from the social leaders’ motivation to defend human rights. It seeks to provide training to improve the resistance capacities of social leaders, and organize conferences to raise awareness of the current situation of each defender.
This ties into the organization’s efforts to ensure safe return of those displaced. As the threat persists upon return to Colombia, the role of organizations that provide international accompaniment is extremely important. Many organizations across Europe work towards similar goals.
The last element is the promotion of safe spaces. The international accompaniment is also extremely useful upon return to Colombia, as it can assist the social leaders’ efforts to create safe spaces for victims, and ultimately develop a self-protection strategy in consultation with the community.
Each Colombian social leader’s story is different. Leaders represent different minorities with distinct grievances. In the recent past, there has been an increase in the visibility of their fight compared to the situation during the FARC conflict. However, this fight will only achieve its full potential if it is accompanied by efforts to study and fix the issues hindering peace building in the state.