Justices Óscar Parra, Eduardo Cifuentes, and Nadiezhda Natazaha Henríquez, from the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), during a press conference in Bogotá.JEP / EFE
Transitional justice in Colombia has stepped on the accelerator. The Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), in charge of judging the most serious events that occurred in the framework of the armed conflict, has charged 15 other military men with war crimes and crimes against humanity for 127 murders on the Caribbean coast as part of the process for the 'false positives', the euphemism with which the murders of civilians by uniformed men are known in the country to present them as guerrillas killed in combat. It is one of the most emblematic cases of the peace court.
"These events would not have occurred without alliances with the paramilitaries and without a set of incentives, threats, and pressure exerted by the commanders on their subordinates to obtain deaths 'in combat,'" said Judge Óscar Parra, one of the rapporteurs in the case. upon reading a statement at the headquarters of the jurisdiction arising from the peace accords, in the north of Bogotá.
"The JEP will continue to investigate the possible participation of higher levels by action or omission," he said.
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The JEP's Reconnaissance Chamber accused the 15 soldiers - which include two lieutenant colonels - of homicide and forced disappearance, whom it considers most responsible for their participation in the crimes attributed to the La Popa battalion, based in Valledupar, the capital. from the department of Cesar, in northern Colombia, between January 9, 2002 and July 9, 2005, with several indigenous people among the victims. The Wiwa and Kankuamo peoples suffered "particularly serious, differentiated and disproportionate damage" by the actions of that battalion, the court stressed.
It also found that the defendants “were part of a criminal organization that was formed within the military unit and through which widespread conduct was deployed, and on a large scale, to present fictitious operational results in which they presented as 'casualties in combat' to persons assassinated in a defenseless state by members of the Army or by paramilitaries ”. In the years investigated, the battalion was commanded by Publio Hernán Mejía and Juan Carlos Figueroa. The investigations determined that 87% of the operational results reported during Colonel Mejía's command were murders and disappearances. The military now have 30 days to decide whether to acknowledge the facts.
It is the second indictment in
case 03
, which investigates "murders and forced disappearances presented as casualties in combat by State agents," after the court had already charged a dozen military personnel this month, including a general, for 120 murders in the Catatumbo region, in Norte de Santander, a department on the border with Venezuela, between 2007 and 2008. These murders sought to increase the official statistics of military success as part of an armed conflict that left more than nine million victims. The 'false positives' are one of the biggest scandals of the Armed Forces in decades of counterinsurgency campaign.
“The JEP sees that the crime pattern in Catatumbo is repeated with its own peculiarities also in the La Popa battalion. It will have to continue the investigations to establish whether with respect to the other military units located throughout the national geography, and at different times, the pattern is repeated, ”said Judge Eduardo Cifuentes, president of the JEP. At least six indictments are expected as part of
case 03
, which in addition to Catatumbo and the Caribbean Coast has prioritized the departments of Antioquia, Huila, Casanare and Meta, in a sample of the extent of the phenomenon.
The 'false positives' were mostly perpetrated between 2002 and 2010, during the two terms of former President Álvaro Uribe, the most staunch opponent of the peace negotiations with the FARC guerrillas. Its multiple ramifications have been a permanent source of shock in a society in transition, which, without avoiding the truth, seeks a reconciliation that has been elusive in the midst of political polarization. In February, the JEP established that between 2002 and 2008 there were more than 6,400 victims of these crimes.
"What basically gave rise to these atrocities was the pressure to produce casualties and everything that was woven around what many have called the Vietnam doctrine," said former President Juan Manuel Santos last month when he appeared before the Commission of the truth. There he defended his role as Defense Minister of the Uribe Government to end extrajudicial executions and apologized to the victims of "false positives."
Considered the backbone of the agreements sealed at the end of 2016, the JEP works at full steam in 2021 with indictments in the two most advanced cases among the seven large processes - or 'macro cases' - that it has opened.
In January, he had already charged the FARC leadership in
case 01
, related to the kidnappings committed by the defunct guerrilla.
The court, together with the Truth Commission and the Unit for the Search for Persons Considered Disappeared, is part of the renamed Comprehensive System for Peace, which, as happened at the time with the negotiations, has had the strong support of the international community. .
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