The head of the delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Colombia, Lorenzo Caraffi, in Bogotá.Carlos Ortega (EFE)
In many regions of Colombia, the war that the peace agreement with the extinct FARC guerrilla sought to extinguish is still burning.
Five years after the signing of that historic pact, humanitarian challenges persist, violence has intensified and the number of internal armed conflicts has increased, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Wednesday when delivering its annual report.
One of those six conflicts that persist, according to the analysis of the humanitarian organization, is the confrontation between the two main dissident factions that separated from the agreements, which for the first time falls into that category.
The scenario may be worse in this 2022.
"In 2021, the population affected by confinement, mass displacement and explosive devices increased considerably, reaching the highest level in the last five years," said Lorenzo Caraffi, head of the ICRC delegation, who has spent more than 50 years operating on the ground in the country.
“We are concerned about the upward trend that we observe in the number of victims and the deepening of different phenomena, particularly because in the first months of this year the humanitarian situation in Colombia has continued to worsen.
In 2022, the picture could be even more complex than it was last year,” he added.
Despite the disarmament of the former Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – today converted into a political party with representation in Congress – a disorderly archipelago of armed groups is still active, with more fractured structures.
“The communities are the ones that suffer the most.
When there was a more limited number of armed actors, at the territorial level it was easier for the communities to manage the situation”, Caraffi said.
“In Colombia traditionally we talk about the conflict, in the singular.
But conflicts [in the plural] have parties, and the parties have an obligation to respect IHL [International Humanitarian Law] in their confrontations and towards the civilian population,” he explained.
In several regions of Colombia, where there are all kinds of illegal economies, the departure of the extinct FARC left a void that other armed actors have been filling, given the lack of state response.
The main phenomenon in the balance of last year has been the restructuring of the armed groups and the struggle for territorial control, with a marked increase in conflict, the humanitarian organization has pointed out.
According to ICRC analysis, at least six non-international armed conflicts currently persist in Colombia.
Three of them are between the government and some armed actor: the National Liberation Army (ELN), the self-styled Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AGC) –better known as the Clan del Golfo, hit by the capture of alias 'Otoniel'– and the old FARC structures that did not join the peace process.
The other three, which were included in the study of what happened in 2021, are the confrontation between the ELN and the AGC, in addition to those that occur between those structures that withdrew from the negotiations, under the command of Gentil Duarte and Iván Mordisco. , with two other factions that consider themselves heirs to the FARC.
On the one hand, the so-called Second Marquetalia, the group of dissidents who took up arms under the command of Iván Márquez, the chief negotiator of the rebels in the talks in Havana.
And on the other, the Border Commands, in a conflict that has shaken the jungle department of Putumayo, bordering Ecuador and Peru.
According to data from the UN Verification Mission and the Government itself, more than 90 percent of the signatories of the peace agreement, some 13,000 former guerrillas, have fulfilled their commitments, remain legal and are advancing in their process. of reinstatement.
Although there was never a disbandment, the fire of the different dissidences has been fueled by new dynamics of forced recruitment, often of minors.
Last year, violence against the civilian population intensified in several regions of the country, generating "indescribable suffering", the ICRC has pointed out.
This deterioration was evidenced, among others, with the increase in victims of explosive devices, as well as with the displacement and confinement of populations.
Humanitarian problems overlap very often, explained Caraffi, the head of the delegation.
Many of the figures recorded in the report set off alarm bells.
Almost 53,000 people were displaced en masse in 11 departments, which represents an increase of 148% compared to 2020. In Nariño, Chocó, Cauca and Valle del Cauca, the departments that are located on the Pacific corridor, the 71st % of those mass displacement events.
In addition, about 80,000 people moved individually, which tends to become a more permanent movement.
On the other hand, the confinements affected more than 45,000 people, 60% more than last year.
Despite the fact that demining efforts are contemplated in the peace agreements, the 486 victims of antipersonnel mines and other types of explosive devices in 2021 are the highest number in the last five years, the majority in Norte de Santander, Cauca, Chocó, Antioquia and Arauca.
In a country where the National Center for Historical Memory has registered more than 80,000 disappeared and the Institute of Legal Medicine has calculated up to 200,000 bodies to be exhumed, "the phenomenon of disappearance is not a thing of the past", the ICRC has also recalled, which has historically supported the search for relatives and documented 168 cases last year, which is equivalent to one disappearance every two days.
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