Colombia

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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Thu Dec 24, 2020 3:10 pm

Is Colombia Entering a New Cycle of War?
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on DECEMBER 23, 2020
Nepomuceno Marín

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Four years after the signing of the Peace Accords between the government of Juan Manuel Santos and a sector of the FARC (Timochenko and Ivan Marquez), various analyses have emerged on this event and on the phenomenon of violence and war in Colombia.

Almost all of the reflections focus on the process of implementation of each of the themes included in the text of the pact to highlight its evident failure, except for the demobilization and handing over of weapons of almost 14 combatants of the agrarian resistance, an issue that was of the highest priority of the dominant elite, represented by Mr. Santos and his negotiating team in Havana, and also for Timochenko, Lozada and the old thread embedded in the political direction of Marulanda’s guerrilla, articulated to the intelligence services of the Military Forces and the police.

The destruction of the programmatic elements of the peace pacts of the Teatro Colon (2016) are not only the work of Uribism and the current Duque government, it is also the consequence of the cunning maneuver of Mr. Santos’ administration, who resorted to various gadgets to prevent a peace with social justice, through the assembly of the plebiscite and the dirty action of the Prosecutor’s Office of that time, focused on destroying the core issues of peace with social justice and democratic reforms.

Integral agrarian reform, expanded democracy, voluntary substitution of crops of illicit use, truth, justice and reparation for the victims of the conflict, non-violent exercise of politics, organization of a political party of the ex-combatants, release of hundreds of political prisoners, are all issues in which failure is an unquestionable fact.

Violence has returned in its worst forms in recent years, with the extermination of hundreds of social leaders, with the assassination of almost 250 ex-guerrillas and with dozens of massacres that saturate public life, as a result, moreover, of deliberate inaction by the public forces so that Uribism can justify its discourse of war and the demand for authoritarian measures that limit civil rights and give the police prerogatives to act violently against social movements.

The conclusion of renowned analysts is quite summary: peace today does not exist and its destruction has sown a new cycle of war in Colombia, making it eternal, like the wars in Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

In Colombia, violence may well be inscribed in the approaches of Byung-Chul Han and his typologies of violence.

The Colombian violence is a protean violence; it changes forms, but remains in time and territories.

In fact, in the last 80 years this country has registered two very acute cycles of violence. The first is that of the 1950’s, which apparently ended with the pacts that gave rise to the National Front, a bipartisan agreement between the liberal and conservative parties; and the second, that of “counter-insurgent violence”, with ample interference by Yankee imperialism, which was intended to end with the neoliberal pacts of 2016, with the sponsorship of Mr. Obama’s government and the collaboration of Cuba.

However, the degradation and decomposition of that supposed Accord has laid the basis for a “new cycle” of violence, in which, from the popular camp, the agrarian and popular resistance is expressed in the belligerent and combative presence of the FARC-EP, which did not sign the Havana’s Santos documents (led by Ivan Lozada of the First Front, Calarcá of the Third Front, Gentil Duarte of the Seventh Front, and Jonnier of the Western Coordinating Command); of the ELN with its geopolitical fronts and rearguard; and of the nucleus that signed the Accords, but later marginalized itself from them (made up of Oscar Montero, Romaña, Aldinever, Marquez and Santrich, known as Nueva Marquetalia).

Despite the fact that the ultra-right wing and the neoliberal elites are trying to stigmatize the guerrilla movements by calling them drug traffickers and criminals, lacking ideology and a revolutionary political project, the truth is that the crisis of the neoliberal peace and that of the political regime itself, sunk in economic collapse, corruption and health disaster, which has caused more poverty and misery in millions of Colombians, has outlined a scenario of great social and popular mobilizations, among which should be included the processes of guerrilla reorganization projecting the renewed revolutionary armed resistance in the years to come, in terms of the profound social, technological and geopolitical changes underway.

What the international experiences are showing is that in the face of the collapse of the empire and its violent and criminal reaction, such as we are seeing in Syria, Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Chile, Brazil, Venezuela, the popular masses are forced to organize their own forms of armed struggle as another way of advancing the destruction of the aberrant State of the banking, landowning and military elites.

Chile, for example, is revealing to us, with its titanic struggle, the need to provide for forms of armed action that contribute to the destruction of the dictatorship of the backward elites who are trampling on the democratic rights of the people.

Translation by Internationalist 360°

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2020/12/ ... le-of-war/
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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Mon Jan 04, 2021 2:26 pm

Another Ex-Guerrilla Member Shot to Death in Caqueta, Colombia

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Citizens hold a sign that reads, 'We are still getting killed' during a protest, Bogota, Colombia, Nov. 5, 2020. | Photo: EFE

Published 4 January 2021

Duvan Arled is the second Peace Agreement signatory killed so far this year.

A former member of the demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) was shot to death by a group of armed men in Cartagena del Chaira municipality, Caqueta Department.

Duvan Arled, 34, was killed on Saturday night, minutes after he left a public establishment in the Antioquia neighborhood. The perpetrators fled after the attack.

The victim was taken to the municipality's hospital, where he later died due to the severity of his injuries. Arled's murder is the second one reported in less than three days.

"Massacres continue this 2021. We demand respect for the lives of the peace signatories who just dream about a new Colombia," the Common Alternative Revolutionary Force (FARC) said.

On January 1, former combatant Yolanda Zabala was also killed with her sister in La Plancha village in Antioquia.

"What painful news. Zabala's murder spread only 12 hours after the new year started. For how long will Colombia continue to bleed out?," FARC member and senator Sandra Ramirez said.

Over 250 combatants have been killed since the Peace Agreement was signed in 2016. The United Nations (UN), foreign governments, and social organizations urged President Ivan Duque to protect ex-guerrillas in the face of increasing violence in Colombia.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Ano ... -0004.html

This doesn't mention the hundreds of social, labor and environmental activists murdered since the adoption of the peace accords. Murders which might have been prevented or at least avenged by the countervailing power which was abandoned by an honest if deluded desire for peace with an implacable enemy.
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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Wed Feb 24, 2021 2:23 pm

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Narco-State Democracy: Colombia’s Duque to Extend His Term ‘Due to COVID-19’
February 17, 2021

Colombian president Iván Duque’s initiative to postpone the elections has caused controversy and doubt. If the proposal is accepted, Duque’s term would be extended for two more years.

Different sectors of Colombian politics have classified it as a “parliamentary coup.” As an excuse, Duque’s proposal uses the saving of resources for vaccination against COVID-19.

The proposal

Gilberto Toro, Executive Director of the Colombian Federation of Municipalities, argued that the proposal is being made to save resources allocated for the electoral process. According to Toro, these resources are necessary for the immunization plan.

“It costs us a lot of money at a time when we must focus on the fundamental right to life and health of Colombians,” added Executive Director of the Colombian Federation of Municipalities, Gilberto Toro.

The Colombian Federation of Municipalities and Departments, among other private and government entities, are proposing holding mega elections in 2024.

Critics point out the irony of Duque’s proposal

An international expert told Orinoco Tribune, “while neighboring Venezuela, blockaded and under US sanctions, held elections last December, and is planning to schedule elections for governors by December 2021—without complaining about a lack of resources, besides the natural condemnation of the US blockade—the Colombian narco-state headed by Alvaro Uribe, using Iván Duque as a puppet, now wants to violate the Colombian constitution and illegally extend his mandate.”

“It is incredible and yet more evidence of Colombian political shamelessness that, while having one of the worst COVID-19 crises in the region, especially because they have done almost nothing to strengthen the healthcare system and take care of Colombians’ health responsibly, at the same time they’re going begging around the world to receive humanitarian financial assistance to take care of Venezuelans that barely see any sort of help from the Colombian government and paradoxically are being excluded from receiving the vaccine, and dare to use COVID-19 as an excuse to perpetuate in power,” the expert added, while wondering how those leaders dare to talk about democracy in Venezuela.

Some Colombian personalities have rejected this proposal. Senator Gustavo Petro described it as a “parliamentary coup.”


Senator Antonio Sanguino, Member of Commission II and Co-Chair of the Peace Commission, described the proposal as “typical rehash.”

For his part, Rafael Martínez, Mayor of Santa Marta, during the period 2016-2019, expressed on his Twitter account: “If the priority is to save lives and save money, the urgent thing is that the Duque government ends.”


Former Vice President Humberto de la Calle, pointed to the proposal to postpone the elections as a “coup, an abuse and a gross violation of the Constitution.”


The management of the current president of Colombia, Iván Duque, is being strongly criticized due to its policies for managing the pandemic. This has added to the increase in massacres and assassinations of social leaders and ex-combatants under the peace agreement.

In addition, in recent days the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE) reported on the reduction of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 6.8%.

Featured image: Tricky Duque using COVID-19 as an excuse to extend his term. (File photo)

(RedRadioVE) with Orinoco Tribune content

Translation: Orinoco Tribune

https://orinocotribune.com/narco-state- ... -covid-19/

Have I not seen that exact expression on the face of Donald Trump? It is the look of a toad that has just swallowed large prey.
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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Tue Mar 23, 2021 2:53 pm

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Biden Pushes Colombia to Restart Glyphosate Spraying Program
March 22, 2021
By Common Dreams staff – Mar 20, 2021

Experts: “The recently announced decision sends an unfortunate message to the Colombian people that your administration is not committed to abandoning the ineffective and damaging war on drugs internationally.”

After a six-year halt, Colombia plans to restart the toxic aerial spraying of glyphosate on coca crops as early as next month—drawing “most welcome” support from U.S. President Joe Biden and sharp criticism from 150 regional experts who wrote to Biden, “your administration is implicitly endorsing former President Trump’s damaging legacy in Colombia.”

On March 2nd, the Biden administration welcomed Colombia’s decision to restart its aerial coca eradication program in Biden’s first annual 2021 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report: “The government of Colombia has committed to re-starting its aerial coca eradication program, which would be a most welcome development.”

Colombia halted the controversial spraying program in 2015. In 2018, Colombia’s then-new President Ivan Duque vowed to resume the program but has yet to restart the aerial spraying

The country faced increasing pressure from the United States to restart the program. “You’re going to have to spray,” former US President Donald Trump told Duque at the White House during a March 2, 2020 meeting.


Aerial fumigation had been a central component of Plan Colombia, the 2005 multi-billion dollar U.S. program to finance the Colombian government war on coca cultivation and their war on FARC, which was Colombia’s largest rebel group before being disbanded in 2017.

But in 2015, the Colombian Supreme Court ruled that the spraying must end if the spraying of glyphosate was creating health problems. Also, in 2015, the World Health Organization found that glyphosate—also known as “Roundup”—was harmful to the environment and health, potentially causing cancer.

In 2014, ending aerial fumigation was central to peace negotiations with FARC, with the Colombian government agreeing with FARC negotiators that it would transition away from aerial spraying. The Colombian government was also facing significant pressure from the rural poor, who were organizing national protests against aerial fumigation and other forms of forced eradication. “National level protests blocking access roads and inhibiting movement were a major hindrance to manual eradication’s ability to operate in major coca-growing regions, and also bedeviled aerial eradication operations,” the US State Department reported in 2014.

VICE News is reporting:

More than 150 experts on drugs, security, and environmental policy in the region have written an open letter to Biden, saying Duque’s spraying campaign is “misguided” and Biden’s decision “could not have come at a worse time.”

“The recently announced decision sends an unfortunate message to the Colombian people that your administration is not committed to abandoning the ineffective and damaging war on drugs internationally, even as your administration takes bold steps to mitigate its multiple impacts on Black, Indigenous, and people of color in the United States,” says the letter, spearheaded by the Center for Studies on Security and Drugs at the Bogotá-based Los Andes University.

“By backing fumigation, your administration is implicitly endorsing former President Trump’s damaging legacy in Colombia,” the letter says. “It was your predecessor who, shortly after taking office, intensified demands on our country to resume spraying with glyphosate, which has been shown to pose significant health and environmental risks to affected populations.”

The experts point to how aerial spraying with glyphosate can cause serious health problems, such as cancer, miscarriages, and respiratory illness, and environmental destruction—biodiversity loss, soil damage, and contamination of water sources.

The aerial fumigation program using glyphosate in Colombia continued throughout the US presidencies of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama.

VICE quoted José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director of Human Rights Watch: “Many peasants grow coca because it is their only profitable crop, given weak local food markets, inadequate roads, and lack of formal land titles,” he said. “Sustainable progress in reducing coca production can only be achieved by ensuring that farmers have a profitable alternative. And there’s no amount of glyphosate that can achieve that.”

Featured image: After a six-year halt, Colombia plans to restart the toxic aerial spraying of glyphosate on coca crops as early as next month—drawing “most welcome” support from U.S. President Joe Biden and sharp criticism from 150 regional experts. (File photo/LUIS ACOSTA/AFP via Getty Images)

https://orinocotribune.com/biden-pushes ... g-program/

Here we see the result of 'lesser-evilism'. (did the cognitive dissonance alarm go off at Common Dreams? Proly haven't changed the battery in years...) So again we see Trump's incompetent imperialism having allowed some of the US's perennial victims a bit of breathing room only to have the screws tightened by the new regime and a return to 'normalcy'.
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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Wed Mar 24, 2021 11:41 am

The FARC-EP, Segunda Marquetalia is Gaining Momentum
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on MARCH 22, 2021
K. Nazari

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The Segunda Marquetalia is gaining momentum.

In the last two weeks, the FARC-EP structure around Iván Márquez and Jesús Santrich came a step closer to its goals of reunifying Colombian insurgency groups. In a recently published communique, the guerilla made clear once again what they stand for: “Unity, unity, unity, that is our motto! United we will be strong and we will deserve respect; divided and isolated, we will perish”.

After the peace deal, the FARC-EP divided into three significant factions: the Segunda Marquetalia, which has returned to armed struggle, the FARC-EP under Gentil Duarte, which never gave up its weapons, and the parliamentary FARC, now known as “Comunes”, which is still holding onto the peace process.

The Segunda Marquetalia has adopted a policy of achieving peace between armed FARC factions. Still, for now, there is a bloody power struggle between the two major armed groups. Segunda Marquetalia’s rivals are hostile toward them for giving up their weapons and “ruining the FARC“. The FARC under Gentil Duarte is considered militarily powerful, with a large amount of territory under their control and access to illegal business. The FARC-EP Segunda Marquetalia is considered politically steadfast with a great deal of know-how, having several former key commanders in their ranks. Their military and territorial strength were previously estimated to be low, but they have achieved some significant accomplishments recently.

500 militants of the CDF (EB) join the ranks of the Segunda Marquetalia.

The illegal and armed group called “Comandos de Frontera – Ejercito Bolivariano” (Border Command – Bolivarian Army) used to fight for territorial control in the south of Colombia in Putumayo. It was classified as a less politicized paramilitary group. However, 500 of their militants are fighting now under the banner of the communist Segunda Marquetalia. The FARC-EP commander Oscar Montero is responsible for reconstructing the southern bloc and will most likely be in charge of unifying the two groups. On March 15, 2021, he announced the creation of a “union of political and military efforts and goals” between the two groups in a public statement. The CDF (EB) also published a report in which they make clear:

“We promise to fight relentlessly against the corrupt who celebrate with contracts and steal public money. (…) All united against corruption and those departmental governments that do not give a shit for the people.”

Segunda Marquetalia expands into northern Colombia: the revival of the Caribbean guerilla bloc.

On March 8th, Jesús Santrich announced the revival of the bloc Martín Caballero and the war fronts 19, 59 and 41 as well as the Danilo García command and the Bertulfo Álvarez commission. From now on, they will fight under the banner of the Segunda Marquetalia. The aforementioned guerilla bloc operates on the Caribbean coast and in Magdalena Medio. Units are immediately beginning to be deployed throughout the Colombian-Caribbean region.

Santrich “emphasized the call for the rapprochement and unity of all FARC-EP structures, whether or not they are members of the Second Marquetalia, as well as the unity of the Colombian insurgents”. He also gave a shout-out to the ELN guerilla, which is an important ally.

The FARC-EP Caribbean bloc was once a medium-sized structure but was also incredibly relevant. Iván Marquez and Santrich used to lead the northern bloc back when the FARC-EP was at its peak before the peace deal. Both will likely recruit members in these areas, in part because of their history with the guerrilla movement there. They know the territory, people and the rules for organizing in the region by heart. The local mountains witnessed some of the bloodiest fighting in the history of the FARC. The guerilla expanded there in the early 1990s while defending its territories against paramilitary and state forces. The Segunda Marquetalia will also have to assert itself against the local structure of the AGC, the most prominent right-wing paramilitary organization in the region, which is known for having ties to the Colombian Armed Forces. The AGC has been in the Montes de María, a strategic corridor, since February 2020, which they use to traffic drugs.

Despite all efforts, the fratricidal war continues.

In the Sumapaz region, a region near Bogotá, there have recently been fights between the FARC-EP Second Marquetalia and the FARC-EP structures under the command of Gentil Duarte. So far, three people have been murdered in these skirmishes. Both organizations are trying to expand into the Sumapaz region and are fighting for territorial control.

Any effort to seek unity with the FARC under Duarte seems distant right now. The strategy of the Segunda Marquetalia appears to be the following. So far, their commanders have not succeeded in uniting with the structures of their rival FARC-EP faction headed by Gentil Duarte. However, Segunda Marquetalia has succeeded in uniting a significant number of those at war with the Gentil Duarte structure under their own banner. Simultaneously, their commanders, Iván Márquez and Jesús Santrich continue to struggle for the unity of all FARC-EP fronts.

K. Nazari is a contributor at Frontlineonline. More of their work can be found at frontlineonline.substack.com.

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2021/03/ ... -momentum/
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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Wed Mar 31, 2021 1:46 pm

Buenaventura: Drug-Trafficking, Armed Conflict and Neoliberal Peace
March 30, 2021

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by Eunice Escobar, translated from Spanish original by Adrián Boutureira

Buenaventura, the Colombian Pacific and other regions of the country remain submerged in a wave of violence that has led to all-new highs in rates of confinement and forced internal displacement. The ancestral territory around this international port is an area affected by armed conflict and especially by illegal paramilitary-type structures that, in the midst of the militarization of the State, dispute control of this strategic center for the global market and for illegal economies around commercial drug and arms trafficking, a context in which killings, threats and assassinations of social leaders have increased. This ongoing violence in ethnic territories has political, structural and ethnic roots. As we described in our call for international solidarity to end the war in Buenaventura, and as indicated by the leader Sulma Mosquera, currently living in El Centro Pazífico in Cali, the solutions to this problem must be structural and based on proposals built with the ethnic communities of the region.

In Buenaventura, during the last two weeks of February and the first two weeks of March, there were a series of activities to listen directly to the voices of the victims, testimonies about the violence affecting the region despite the existence of two agreements in the implementation phase, the Agreement of the Civic Strike of 2018 and the Final Agreement for the termination of the conflict and the construction of a stable and lasting peace signed between the government of Colombia and the former FARC E-P guerrillas. In my particular case, and on behalf of the Alliance, I was also there to accompany Human Rights leaders threatened by the armed sectors and participate in the commemoration of the seventh Anniversary of the march “Entierro de la Violencia para Vivir con Dignidad en Buenaventura” (Burial of Violence to Live with Dignity in Buenaventura) originally organized by the late Archbishop Emeritus of Buenaventura, Monsignor Hector Epalza Quintero. AfGJ took part in supporting the activities at Station 5 of the march. The theme of the station was Protection of Life and Territory. AFJG also took part in 3 days of activities with participating embassies from various countries in a tour that included the Chapel of Memory in the Lleras neighborhood and the Humanitarian Zones of Puente Nayero and Punta Icaco in the La Playita neighborhood.

During these two weeks, the Human Rights Commission of the Senate of the Republic also visited Buenaventura and in a day session listened directly to those affected by the social and humanitarian crisis there.

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Likewise, Father Francisco de Roux, president of the Truth Commission, visited Buenaventura and condemned the difficult situation in which the people of Buenaventura are living. “We have many questions and much pain” said the priest referring to the violence that was unleashed in the month of December with the massacre that occurred on December 31, 2020, when armed men made a deadly sweep through the city searching for victims door to door to murder them. “What caused the greatest impression on me today when I was in the surroundings of the Estero, is to find that what one sees there is an absolutely unacceptable reality that cannot be, that Colombians have to live as they do in some of the areas I have seen lately.”

In similar fashion, he denounced the living conditions of the inhabitants of these communes, indicating: “The standard of living of some people in Buenaventura is so shameful, that I do not understand how it is possible that Colombia accepts such an inhumane thing. It is of such proportions what one sees there, it is so sad what one perceives there, it is so degrading of the human being, it is such an inhumane way for people to have to live that one is really left wondering: How is it possible that we Colombians accept that men and women with the same human dignity, with the same human greatness, with the same human depth have to live like that?”

During this visit, the special commissioner for ethnic peoples, Leyner Palacios, questioned the incoherence between the way of life and the value of firearms that some people possess: “We ask ourselves, where are we Colombians who allow this to happen to other Colombians? There is an ethical and moral responsibility here. It was disheartening to hear that young people live in houses that cost no more than six or seven million pesos, but they have rifles and weapons that cost 30 or 40 million. Someone is giving them those weapons.”

In support of the current bishop of Buenaventura, Ruben Dario Jaramillo (who received death threats for having on several occasions denounced corruption, the territorial control wielded by the powerful groups of Buenaventura, criminal groups, the wave of violence experienced by the population, displacements and drug trafficking) 14 prelates, including bishops and priests from the Colombian Pacific region, also gathered in Buenaventura to express their solidarity with Monsignor Jaramillo and to discuss the issues of violence and inequality that affect this region.

Background:

In Colombia violence began more than 50 years ago due to land tenure, conditions of injustice and inequity and the political interests of a few families that have consolidated power since the onset of the republic in the nineteenth century. Buenaventura, an ancestral territory of the black and indigenous people, was impacted several centuries ago with the installation of the main port of Colombia, a port that was beneficial to the black population while it was a national company (Colpuertos) managed by the Colombian state and with a strong union. Violence came to this port city at the same time that the national government signed the first trade agreements and began the privatization process in the framework of the free market that was promoted by the 1991 constitution, a process that favored the country’s economic sectors and favored the entry of foreign capital, the same that currently promotes the expansion and modernization.

As expressed by community leaders during our visit to the region, with the 1991 constitutional reform and the previous peace agreement with the M19 guerrilla, the “Great Economic Opening” of Colombia to the “future”, to the new global order imposed by the free market was announced under the government of President Gaviria. Within this regulatory framework, the dissolution of Colpuertos was decreed and the conditions for the modernization of the port sector and its operation through the Regional Port Companies and Port Operators were defined. This new management model of the port sector, justified under the banner of increasing the competitiveness of the sector and of the Colombian economy, led to job reductions and the outsourcing of labor at the port. Between 2012 and 2016 the Territorial Direction of Valle del Cauca has imposed sanctions for labor intermediation in the port sector in the region that exceed 11 billion pesos, while other labor regulations violations amount to 3 billion pesos.

On the other hand, Transitory Article 55 gave rise to Law 70/93 on black communities and materialized the historical dream of the Afro-Colombian people to achieve legal recognition of their territory.

However, collective titling under Law 70 failed to include the legal recognition of strategic territories of interest to the market and global capital, such as the urban area of Buenaventura where, legally and illegally, and through terror, territorial dispossession continues to be imposed to make way for the expansionary projects of the Port Companies.

Likewise, and as an effective mechanism to consolidate territorial dispossession and rights violations, the establishment decided to use the existence of the State’s internal armed conflict with different guerrilla movements to escalate the violence and implement a State policy based on paramilitarism, national security and the internal enemy, promoted for some time by the United States and financed under Plan Colombia. Thus, in Buenaventura and the rest of the Pacific region of Colombia, under the complicity and sponsorship of the military and the government, the paramilitary organization Calima Bloc was ushered in to consolidate the country’s strategic businesses.

In the mid-Pacific region and in Buenaventura, the Calima Bloc perpetrated 35 massacres between 2000 and 2004, leaving political and economic power in the hands of a mafia sector, which had been on the rise since the 1980s thanks to the Medellín cartel and the Norte del Valle cartel, from where narco-paramilitary structures such as the well-known Machos and Rastrojos made their appearance.

In April 2001, the Calima Bloc’s incursion into the Pacific region attempted to forcibly displace the population in the ancestral territory of the Consejo Comunitario del Río Naya (Community Council of the Naya River) just when the request for collective titling had been formalized and contested by the University of Cauca. In the urban sphere, during these same years of terror and control by the Calima Block, land dispossession was consummated in the critical ancestral and collective territory of Bajo Calima, where the principle of urban expansion was invoked to later build the intermodal port of Agua Dulce with investment from International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI) of the Philippines and PSA of Singapore. Likewise, after the massacre of the 12 young people of Punta del Este, in April 2005, the Buenaventura Container Terminal (“TCBUEN”) started operating with the investment of Oscar Isaza, a native of Buenaventura, together with Spaniards from the Barcelona-based, Grup Maritim TCB.

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Organizers meet in the Centro Pazífico to discuss responses to the crisis in Buenaventura

In 2004, with the very loudly publicized demobilization of the Calima Block, the narco-paramilitaries known as the Águilas Negras and the Rastrojos once again took control of the Pacific region, including Buenaventura and its coastal areas, giving urban control to the Empresa gang, an operation that since 2007 has implemented urban terror through the “casas de pique” (“chop houses” – residential places for torture, murder and human body dismembering) and the “invisible borders” (invisible boundaries inside a neighborhood or territory) always in the presence of the government forces that make Buenaventura the most militarized city in Colombia. Since then, the control of territories not secured for port expansion and modernization have been subject to the terror and control of paramilitary structures. Meanwhile, they continue to announce new megaprojects such as the Malecón Bahía de la Cruz, Plan Máster 2050 and the international cargo airport, among others.

By 2016, when the Peace Agreement was signed, Buenaventura remained under the control of armed paramilitary elements: the structure known as La Empresa, the Urabeños, the misnamed Autodefensas Gaitanistas de Colombia (AGC) and even alleged dissidents such as the Fuerza Urbana del Pacífico (FUP) who, in the name of Front 30 of the FARC E-P, took control of corridors such as the Naya with the support and complicity of the security forces.

The reality is that in neighborhoods of Buenaventura, like La Playita, there are some sectors, such as Alfonso Lopez and Piedras Cantana, heavily impacted by extortion at the hands of different armed sectors. The population is Afro-Colombian, poor, dispersed from their community councils, and victims of forced displacement. All neighborhoods have suffered intra-urban displacement with some exceptions, such as the Puerto Nayero community that since 2014, due to the installation of the humanitarian zone and thanks to its civil resistance initiative, has enjoyed protection and security.

From the beginning of 2021 until March 17, 2021, there have been 17 massacres in Colombia, with a total of 65 victims. Buenaventura is a clear reflection of this humanitarian crisis, a product of the non-compliance of the two historic agreements, the Peace Treaty and the Civic Strike Agreement. As indicated by the leader Maria Eugenia Mosquera Riascos, “In our rural and urban territories, we have not stopped building, resisting and weaving peace, however, the absence of political will of the national government to comply with the signed agreement, takes us back to the worst times of conflict and war.”

With the upsurge of violence in Buenaventura and according to police data, there have been 69 disappearances in Buenaventura since last year. This year, in January alone, approximately 12 people have disappeared. The forced recruitment of girls, boys, adolescents and young people (NNAJ in its Spanish acronym) for informant network activities, logistical support, arms transportation, drug transportation, extortion, as well as for the growth of organic membership of the successor structures of paramilitarism, are increasing in all neighborhoods of Buenaventura, exceeding the figures of previous years (in some rural areas the proportion is higher than 10 cases for each NNAJ recruited by guerrilla structures, such as the FARC E-P, in times of armed conflict.

Similarly, the number of missing persons after the signing of the Final Agreement for the termination of the conflict and the Civic Strike Agreement, especially in rural areas, almost equals the cases that occurred in a period of 20 years of internal armed conflict.

In the territories with a permanent presence of state security forces deployed under the terms of the Final Peace Agreement and the presence of narco-paramilitary structures, prostitution sites are increasing and there is a high presence of Venezuelan women. Just as with the women from Buenaventura, migrant women are also subjected to various forms of sexual violence, having to relate affectionately and sexually with armed actors for their safety or to guarantee satisfaction of their needs and those of their families.

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Buenaventura youth welcome international visitors

Who are the disappeared? Most of them are young men from the neighborhoods, between 14 and 25 years of age. Who disappears them? The armed sectors that we mentioned earlier and that are in the territory. Those who fight for control of the corridor and involve them in the war. These children and adolescents become involved in the war and the illicit business due to lack of opportunities, the structural racism that these regions experience, and the lack of compliance by the government. These young victims of the invisible borders live imprisoned in their neighborhoods and in their streets. Some of them, just for crossing these invisible borders, are disappeared. The violation of armed curfews are also death sentences. These young people are forced to leave their neighborhoods, as did the children of Doña Zulma and other young people who are now in the Centro Pazifico, now operating at full capacity.

In Buenaventura, the most militarized city in Colombia, we ask ourselves, where is the military presence? Because there is no end to this violence that ends the lives of young black people. Why do the lives of young blacks in Buenaventura and the Pacific not matter?

Visiting these neighborhoods, I can only refer to the neighborhoods on the south side of Chicago, where black and Latino youth are the victims of structural racism in the United States. Keeping proportions in mind, the conditions are identical: lack of access to education, lack of access to health care, lack of economic opportunities and lack of a nuclear family and a protective environment. Easy access to weapons, drugs and crime as a labor option. This lack of opportunities has also led them to take up arms and participate in a war between armed groups (gangs) generating a number of victims that reaches the level of genocide. Similarly in Chicago and the United States, police force and violence is the solution given us by the system of racism and the lack of real commitment on the part of the government. So-called black-on-black crime, the fruit of state genocide and ethnocide, continues to take our Afro youth in the Colombian Pacific and in Chicago.

This violence is explained by the control and terror that must be imposed on the communities and ethnic peoples, the ancestral owners and inhabitants of the territories now set for expansion and modernization, in this case, of port activity. This has been the most effective way for the Colombian government to sow terror, fear and silence, for drug trafficking and to perpetuate the political power of the elites at the service of their own interests and of the international market, to evade its political and legal responsibilities for human rights violations, this government that failed to comply with the Civic Strike Agreements and the Peace Agreement, that has perfected out of its paramilitary strategy, an effective policy of population and territorial control.

So what is the State’s non-compliance?

The Pacific region with its social and humanitarian crisis is an example of the non-implementation of the agreement. One of the most serious threats to peace is the Colombian government’s refusal to comply with the agreement with respect to points one and four, which deal with land issues and illicit crops. This non-compliance has been encouraged by the U.S. government, in particular:

The non-implementation of Points 1 and 4, the National Program for the Integral Substitution of Illicitly Used Crops (PNIS for its Spanish acronym) and the Program for Development with a Territorial Approach (PDET for its Spanish acronym).
Point 3.4, which was to guarantee in Buenaventura and Tumaco a pilot strategy for the effective dismantling of the successor structures of paramilitarism.
On many occasions, when campesinos have protested to demand that the government honor its commitments for rural development and inclusion in illicit crop substitution programs, instead of fulfilling its duties, the Armed Forces, and in particular the Mobile Anti-riot Squadron (ESMAD for its Spanish acronym) -co-founded and armed by the U.S., have attacked the civilian population while the armed sectors continue to assassinate social leaders, human rights defenders, campesinos, Afro-Colombians, indigenous people and peace signatories.

In three decades of terror and narco-paramilitary control in Valle del Cauca, with a clear epicenter in Cali, northern Valle and Buenaventura with its strategic corridors, it is evident that it has been the best scenario for the consolidation of what can be called neoliberal peace, where the circulation of legal and illegal goods matters more than the life of the population, based on thousands of people disappeared, murdered, displaced from an ancestral and biodiverse territory offered to the highest bidder; where the murders are not the product of elimination among bandits, but fully related to the transnational business of drug trafficking, the global mercantile interests of the country’s largest port and the perpetuation of political power in the hands of the same elite that has governed Colombia since its existence as a Republic. In the midst of torture and death houses, mass graves, dispossession, misery, racism and new slavery, Buenaventura continues to consolidate itself as the CAPITAL OF THE PACIFIC ALLIANCE, for transnational trade agreements.

For all of the above, we call on the international community to support the following demands:

*That the government of Colombia comply with the Agreements of the Civic Strike.
*That the Colombian government truly comply with the Peace Accords, and in particular with points 1 and 4.
*That the government of the United States support this initiative.
*That the government of Colombia dismantle, and the U.S. not finance, the Mobile Anti-Riot Squad (ESMAD in its Spanish acronym), as it has become the primary instrument of state repression against protest mobilizations in the countryside over land and eradication;
*That the government of Colombia comply with the agreement, that it NOT resume aerial spraying in the countryside, and that the United States not advocate for aerial spraying, as it is a practice that puts the health of communities at risk and damages the environment;
*That the government of Colombia put an end to the assassinations and massacres against members of popular movements and signatories of the Peace Accords, and not allow impunity for the authors and perpetrators of these crimes.
*That the Colombian government release political prisoners in accordance with the Final Peace Accord and that the U.S. government release Simon Trinidad

Send an email to Colombian and international authorities in support of these demands!
https://afgj.salsalabs.org/buenaventura ... index.html

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Here are some great ways you can help!
Support the activities of the Centro Pazifico!
https://afgj.salsalabs.org/centropacifico/index.html

Participate in the accompaniment delegations organized by the Alliance for Global Justice! (For more information: delegations@AFGJ.org )

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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Tue Apr 06, 2021 11:50 am

THE COLOMBIAN PARAMILITARY IS A "LEGITIMATE SON OF THE STATE"
5 Apr 2021 , 8:33 am .

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Salvatore Mancuso, former paramilitary leader, being escorted by the Colombian police (Photo: Caracol Radio)

In recent statements before a court in Colombia, one of the most important paramilitary leaders, founder of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUV), Salvatore Mancuso , ratified what has been denounced for many years: that paramilitarism is created and directed by the Colombian State itself.

In his virtual testimony from a jail in the United States, Mancuso not only affirmed that "the paramilitaries are children of the State", but also emphasized that "it was not from bad apples but was something that is implemented by the high command, both military as politicians of the country, "referring to the arguments of Colombian politicians and military personnel who have repeatedly said that the links demonstrated between politicians and military personnel with these groups are the product of" bad apples "and not of state policy.

Mancuso even asserts that he was recruited by high military commanders in the mid-1980s to form the self-defense groups and points out that this practice of recruiting civilians to form such groups is instructed in manuals of the Military Forces of the time.

He also confessed that daily one of the high command of the National Police of Colombia reviewed his extermination activities and demanded compliance.

To such an extent these paramilitary groups have been integrated into the Public Force since their birth that even, according to this testimony, the AUC, the police and the Colombian Military Forces carried out joint operations and planned the national growth of these irregular groups "by quadrants" in order to take over the territory.

This has been denounced for many years by activists, researchers and people dedicated to the defense of human rights, such as the Jesuit priest Javier Giraldo , who says in one of his research papers:

" The 1980s represented an exorbitant growth of paramilitarism, driven by the alliance with the biggest drug traffickers and the power of their money, and for this reason the paramilitary structures multiplied throughout the country and displayed cruel power, of shameless articulation with the institutions of the State and of daring impunity ".

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Colombian paramilitaries were financed and protected by key sectors of the Colombian State (Photo: AFP)

With Mancuso's accusation against generals, colonels, and politicians like Álvaro Uribe Vélez himself, whose presidential campaign claims to have actively financed and supported, new evidence is added to the political responsibility of governments and the State in the criminal actions of these organizations. .


In addition, these complaints against Uribe confirm, for example, some of those made by Senator Iván Cepeda before the Colombian Congress in 2012, and it was Uribe's maneuvers to get rid of those complaints that ended up opening a case against him for manipulation. of witnesses and procedural fraud.

This explains why the abandonment of the borders of Colombia, in particular the border with Venezuela, where the military presence and the other institutions of the Colombian State is minimal, as has been repeatedly denounced by President Nicolás Maduro, and recently by the Minister of Popular Power for Defense, G / J Vladimir Padrino López, referring to the recent deployment of Colombian troops in the border department of Arauca:

"They gave the territory to the criminal drug trafficking gangs and now they want, as they dispute it there, to come and dispute a piece here. It is not going to happen, it is not allowed."

Certainly, what is really happening on this border is that the Colombian State has delegated territorial control to drug traffickers, paramilitaries, private contractors who guard the transnational companies in the area and US troops and military installations , while only facing the forces of the left and the it attacks organized communities and their leaders.

The links between these paramilitary organizations and the State also blame the State for the high number of massacres and selective assassinations of leaders and social leaders: so far in 2021 it has already cost the lives of 43 leaders and social leaders, 13 former combatants of the FARC-EP signatories of the peace agreement, in addition to 23 massacres only until March 28 of this year.

For the same reason, between March 25 and 27, the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal met in Colombia to try the Colombian State for political genocide, crimes against peace and impunity, and leaders from different social sectors appeared before it. , as well as intellectuals and relatives of victims as complainants.

Drug trafficking and Colombian paramilitary organizations have also become protagonists of the constant attack against Venezuela, as demonstrated by Operation Daktari and Operation Gideon, favoring the interests of the United States and the Colombian political class, which have defined the role of this country as a beachhead to attack Venezuela.

The recent events in Apure state are the product of this reality and are part of the scenarios of the hybrid war against the Bolivarian Revolution.

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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Sat Apr 24, 2021 2:10 pm

Armed Groups Attack Colombian Indigenous Governor's Funeral

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ONIC issued an open letter, in which it denounces the risk situation experienced by the indigenous communities of Cauca. | Photo: Twitter/@clacpi

Published 22 April 2021 (14 hours 13 minutes ago)

In the incident, 22 people have been reported wounded, and indigenous authorities have captured five attackers.


The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC) denounced Thursday that armed men shot at members of an indigenous minga, which was advancing in the sector of the Ancestral Lagoon of Siberia, in Caldono, department of Cauca, in rejection of the murder of the indigenous governor Sandra Liliana Peña Chocue.

According to the most recent information from ONIC, 22 people have been reported wounded, while members of the so-called "Minga hacia dentro" have managed to capture five of the attackers. Previously the indigenous organization released on its official profile on Twitter a statement promoting the event.

"Armed men are attacking the Minga Hacia Adentro, which in the exercise of the defense and protection of the territory the brothers of the indigenous peoples of Cauca have been carrying out. So far, several people have been reported injured, including traditional authorities, indigenous guards, and community members," the text indicated.

The ONIC specified that the 22 wounded were transferred to the village of El Pescador and from there to a medical center. One of them is in serious condition. It also revealed that members of the minga reportedly detained five of the men who fired the shots.

On April 20, Governor Sandra Peña was assassinated after four armed men forced her out of her house to shoot her. Counselor Ferley Quintero stated that the governor had planned to travel to the city of Popayán to attend a meeting with the national government when she was the victim of the attack.

Quintero also noted that Liliana Peña had recently stated her opposition to the increase of illicit coca crops in the department, a position she held as governor and exercised territorial control against the presence of armed groups.

As a result of this work, the indigenous leader received death threats from the irregular armed groups that control Cauca, especially the municipality of Caldono, where her reservation is located.


"#ALERT| At this moment, armed men are attacking the Minga inside the ancestral territory of La Laguna Siberia in Caldono, Cauca. There are 7 people WOUNDED with firearms, including indigenous guards. #SOSPueblosIndígenas."

Given the situation, ONIC issued an open letter. It exposed the risks that indigenous communities in Cauca live in due to the increase in violence and authorities' inaction, given the extent of the problem.

"National and international public opinion should urgently accept our call and place all their resources to make known the reality that today plagues our territories, without stigmatization or criminalization of our communities, we are the victims of this war," the letter stated.

The document also lamented the death of Governor Liliana Peña. It stated that aside from her assassination, 44 social leaders and local authorities have been murdered in Colombia so far this year. In addition, they hold the State responsible for assuming a position of indifference and lack of protection in the face of the pain of the indigenous communities.

"Today we mourn the death of Governor Sandra Liliana Peña, of the Resguardo La Laguna Siberia de Caldono, which is added to the more than 44 leaders and authorities murdered this year alone, so we must affirm without delay that the Colombian State is solely responsible for its institutional neglect and its inability to protect our lives against the onslaught of illegal actors in our territories," the text stated.

It also denounced that there is a crisis in the implementation of the Peace Agreement, mainly concerning the "Ethnic Chapter for Peace," and reiterated that a sign of this is "the trail of deaths, massacres, confinements and dispossession that threaten the survival of our peoples," the ONIC said.

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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Fri Apr 30, 2021 12:48 pm

Colombia on Strike against the Far-Right and Neoliberalism
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on APRIL 28, 2021
Tanya Wadhwa

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Banner reading “The narco-paramilitary state will fall” hung from a bridge in Bogotá on the morning of April 28. Photo: Congreso de los Pueblos

Organizations reject Duque’s neoliberal tax reform which seeks to make Colombia’s working class pay for the fiscal deficit incurred due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Colombian citizens, members of trade unions, social movements and opposition political parties are participating in a national strike in cities and towns across the country today, on April 28. The protest actions have been called in rejection of the Sustainable Solidarity bill, a new tax reform bill presented to the Congress by the far-right government of president Iván Duque to finance the economic crisis or compensate for the fiscal deficit incurred due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The marches, demanding the withdrawal of the reform, will begin at 9:00 local time in the main cities of the country. In the capital Bogota, the protesters will gather at the National Park and will march from there to the Bolívar Plaza. The organizers of the national strike and nationwide mobilizations have called on the demonstrators to follow all biosecurity protocols in place with greater responsibility to avoid the contagion of COVID-19. Organizations have also organized blockades of major highways and roads across national territory as well as other actions to manifest their rejection of the far-right government’s policies.

Yesterday, on April 27, various leaders of the National Strike Committee, which brings together a diverse group of social organizations and trade unions, and the Unitary National Command, the country’s trade union center which is made up of the Central Union of Workers (CUT), the Confederation of Workers of Colombia (CTC), the General Confederation of Labor (CGT), the Colombian Federation of Education Workers (Fecode), the Confederation of Pensioners of Colombia (CPC) and the Domestic Confederation of Pensioners (CDP), ratified their intention to take to the streets and go forward with the strike as planned, despite the efforts by government authorities to make it illegal and suspend it.

In the past days, various government authorities such as the Ministry of Health and the Attorney General’s Office, have called to postpone the mobilizations due to the third wave of coronavirus in the country. Yesterday, a day before the strike, in a desperate attempt, the Administrative Court of Cundinamarca suspended the right to public protest on April 28 and May 1, revoking permissions for anti-government protests and Labor Day celebrations. The decision was widely rejected by trade unions, social sectors and the opposition. Following the court orders, the Ministry of Defense called on the people to not participate in the mobilizations.

La Campaña Defender la Libertad (the Defend Freedom Campaign), a network of social organizations that denounce arbitrary detentions, judicial persecution and criminalization of social protest in Colombia, condemned the order and emphasized that “it ignores the jurisprudence and the international norms in force on the matter (right to protests), since only the law can limit the exercise of the protest.” The organization highlighted that “the protest cannot be suspended even under states of emergency. Therefore, the Court’s measure violates guarantees of due process and due notification to interested parties.” It added that “these orders are not enforceable for citizens, since they can exercise the right to protest without prior permission.”

The campaign pointed out that “despite the court orders, the Colombian state has a legal duty to provide protection to protesters, even if the demonstration does not have the unnecessary prior “permission” and urged that “freedom and integrity must be guaranteed!” The organization pointed out that “the court orders do not sympathize with the reality of the country, the climate of dissatisfaction and imposes an unreal condition such as herd immunity, which is uncertain. Therefore, the measures become innocuous or empty, and unattainable by the citizenry.”

Similarly, Francisco Maltés, the president of the CUT, affirmed that “the Constitutional Court has said that the right to protest is fundamental and can be exercised when citizens agree. It cannot be denied, much less terminated, by any authority, not even in times of emergency, or in the conditions of state of exception. For this reason, we do not need to ask for permission from any authority to exercise this legitimate right.” Maltés reiterated that “on April 28, we are going on a national, peaceful, orderly and non-belligerent strike to demand the abolition of the tax reform.”

Senator Gustavo Petro of the progressive Colombia Humana party, warned that the government’s attempts to ban protests seeks to “create confrontations between the people and the police.” “What we need to understand tomorrow is that the success of the strike does not only depend on the success of protests. It is more than anything the cessation of all activities,” added Petro.

The said controversial bill was presented by finance minister Alberto Carrasquilla on April 15, as a tool to allegedly alleviate poverty in the midst of the health and economic crisis. In the name of solidarity, the government seeks to pass a tax reform that increases the VAT on staple goods, fuel, and various public services; expands the tax collection base; increases the tax on agricultural inputs; increases the tax on pensions; freezes the wages in the public sector until 2026; eliminates subsidies on various public services; imposes toll tax on roads connecting countrysides with cities; among other measures.

The trade unions and social organizations denounced it as a hard blow to the middle class and deemed it as “Duque’s neoliberal package”. They stressed that it threatens the economic stability of workers, pensioners, and people with lower incomes, and will only increase poverty and inequality in the country.

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Re: Colombia

Post by blindpig » Sat May 01, 2021 1:16 pm

Repression of protests in Cali, Colombia leaves at least eight dead

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Human Rights representatives blamed the president and the mayor of Cali for the police repression of the massive demonstrations against the tax reform. | Photo: EFE
Published May 1, 2021 (8 hours 33 minutes ago)

According to the Francisco Isaias Cifuentes Human Rights Network, the police action has left a balance of 84 detainees, 28 wounded and three missing protesters.

Colombian Human Rights Organizations denounced that at least eight people died as a result of police repression in the city of Calí, during the third day of protests against the tax reform promoted by President Ivan Duque.

According to the report presented on Friday by the Francisco Isaias Cifuentes Human Rights Network, in addition to the eight deaths, the police action has left a balance of 84 detainees, 28 wounded and three missing protesters.

They also indicated that among the injured, there are three people with loss of eyes and a case of sexual abuse by police officers.


Despite the death toll presented by the human rights body, the communities have reported at least 14 deaths due to repression in various neighborhoods of the Colombian city.

The Francisco Isaias Cifuentes Human Rights Network pointed out that of the eight confirmed deaths, the first victims were two minors reported on April 28.


During the press conference, the human rights organizations warned that they have not been able to carry out their work under complete normality, despite the prior agreement with the authorities, which is why they do not know the whereabouts of some of the people detained by the forces. police.

The organizations indicated that they received reports of police actions in the Calipso, El Diamante and various popular sectors of the city of Cali on Friday night.


Human Rights representatives blamed the president and the mayor of Cali for the police repression of the massive demonstrations against the tax reform.

They rejected the proposal of the government of the Valle del Cauca department and the city to militarize Cali in an attempt to put an end to the mobilizations. Defense Minister Diego Molano announced on Friday the arrival of some 3,000 police and military in Cali.

The president of Colombia, Iván Duque, announced this Friday that he is going to review the tax reform project rejected with massive mobilizations since last April 28 in several cities of the country.

"I have given a very clear instruction to the Ministry of Finance to (...) build a new text with Congress that gathers consensus and also allows it to be nurtured by valuable proposals" from the parties, the private sector and civil society, he declared on his daily television program.


Duque's proposal was rejected by the opposition, unions, students and other civil society organizations who described it as inappropriate and especially aggressive towards the middle class.

https://www.telesurtv.net/news/colombia ... -0031.html

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