Colombia: News & Updates

Colombia's new president said Saturday he was suspending arrest warrants and extradition requests for members of the left-wing guerrilla group the National Liberation Army (ELN) in an effort to restart peace talks to end nearly 60 years of war. The announcement is part of a principal campaign promise by newly elected Gustavo Petro, a former member of the M-19 insurgency, who took office on Aug. 7 on pledges to bring "total peace" to the Andean country. "This resolution initiates a new possibility of a peace process in Colombia," Petro said after attending a security council meeting in the province of Bolivar.

Thousands of Colombians have celebrated in the streets what is hoped to be a “second liberation,” now from neoliberalism, via the ascension of the first left-wing president in the country’s history, Gustavo Petro, together with his vice president, Francia Márquez, to power. A former guerrillero and an Afro-Colombian activist now hold the highest political positions in the country, a turning point in Colombian political history and a key moment for the whole of Latin America. But Petro and Francia will not have much time to celebrate. Huge challenges await them.

While the US and Colombia are different, the need to reckon with structural racism and its effects on the basic, civil, economic, socio-political rights of ethnic minorities are not dissimilar. The obstacles faced by Afro-descendant and Indigenous persons in both nations share root causes and challenges. Ethnic communities have a strong history of leadership, resistance, resilience, organization, and activism in both countries. Also, the drug and military policies in the US and Colombia that disproportionately negatively affect ethnic communities are interlinked.

Former right-wing President of Colombia, Ivan Duque, has landed a job at the Washington-based Wilson Center as a “Distinguished Fellow” and Global Advisor” for issues including defense of democracy and climate change, despite his atrocious record on human rights and environmental destruction. Whilst Duque’s supposed democratic credentials are lauded in Washington, Colombia is the most dangerous places in the Americas to be an indigenous or union leader, a situation that has worsened under Duque’s leadership. As of May 2022, the murder of community leaders averaged out at one every two days.  

On Sunday, August 7, Colombia will inaugurate its first ever leftist President, Gustavo Petro, and its first Afro descendant Vice President, Francia Márquez. The new administration inherits a country hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and its economic fallout, one that in 2021 experienced a national strike and protests, and with an abysmal human rights record. Expectations that the Petro government will immediately remedy the economic and social problems facing Colombia are high. However, many of the challenges ahead are due to structural factors for which there is no quick fix.

On behalf of IRTF’s Rapid Response Network (RRN) members, we wrote six letters this month to heads of state and other high-level officials in Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras, urging their swift action in response to human rights abuses occurring in their countries.  We join with civil society groups in Latin America to: (1) protect people living under threat, (2) demand investigations into human rights crimes, (3) bring human rights criminals to justice.

IRTF’s Rapid Response Network (RRN) volunteers write six letters in response to urgent human rights cases each month. We send copies of these letters to US ambassadors, embassy human rights officers, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, regional representatives of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and desk officers at the US State Department. To read the letters, see https://www.irtfcleveland.org/content/rrn , or ask us to mail you hard copies.

I trust that you, like me and many around the world, are still celebrating and feeling the hope of the people’s victory in the recent presidential elections of Colombia. Just as we saw the hope of new beginnings in Chile and Honduras, this victory was only made possible by the unstoppable and ongoing work of social movements, particularly the resistance of Indigenous communities. In this moment of hope and celebration, we must also acknowledge that much has been sacrificed to get here.

A special peace tribunal investigating atrocities committed during Colombia’s decades-long conflict has charged 19 soldiers with war crimes and crimes against humanity for murdering 303 people, mostly civilians, between 2005 and 2008. The murders form part of what is known in Colombia as “false positives”, where the military killed civilians and then presented them as fighters to try to inflate the effectiveness of their fight against rebels. In return, the soldiers received special benefits such as help to gain promotion.

President-elect Gustavo Petro and Vice President-elect Francia Marquez won an historic race with the promise to bring about deep social, economic and political change in Colombia. Only about half of the population has formal work. Just a quarter of eligible adults have access to the pension system. The pandemic made matters worse. After years of stagnation, poverty is rising again. Will Petro, the first left-wing president in the history of the country, be able to keep his promises?