Colombia

A thematic rights-based approach to the life stories

In this section of the website, you can access the testimonies through quotes organised in 13 key themes. The themes have been chosen because they appear recurrently in the interviews and represent the main effects of forced displacement. They also coincide with the rights and guarantees to prevent forced displacement and to protect and assist internally displaced people during their displacement, return or resettlement.

The themes have been linked to the relevant provisions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. Recognized as an “important international framework” for the protection of internally displaced people (IDPs) by world leaders at their 2005 Summit, the Guiding Principles have also been referred to at the national level, including by the Colombian Constitutional Court. In its decision SU-1150 of August 2000, the Court recognized their relevance for the national context by stating that they constitute a “parameter for any new legislation on displacement as well as for the interpretation of the existing IDP legislation, and the assistance to displaced persons.”

You can view the complete testimonies to learn more about the narrator’s personal experience through the link at the end of the quote.

• The right to associate freely
  
  In Colombia, displaced communities’ leaders, members of organizations of displaced people and the human right defender who accompany them, have been systematically attacked because they are telling the truth and ask for justice and integral reparation.
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• Forced disappearance and forced displacement
  
  Forced disappearances are a crime against humanity that generate terror and in many cases force the family of the victims to displace. Between July of 2002 and June of 2006, at least 1.613 persons have been forcibly disappeared in Colombia – an average of one person disappeared every day.
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• The right to education
  
  The Colombian government policy on education for displaced children has been limited to create places at school. Such measure does not respond to the needs and does not address other obstacles that face displaced families to send or keep their children at school, such as the lack of money to buy uniforms, to pay transport or alimentation.
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• The rights of internally displaced women
  
  Women represent between 49 and 58% of the total displaced population. “Women are important victims of displacement. They informed the (UN) Representative that reasons for their displacement include: assassination of their spouses; protection of themselves or their children from sexual or gender-based violence; protection of their children from forced recruitment by armed groups.
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• The rights of indigenous peoples, minorities, peasants
  
  The Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities represent 8 per cent and 2 per cent of Colombians respectively and have been traditionally marginalized in an already unequal society.
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• The rights of internally displaced children
  
  The population that has been the more affected by forced displacement in Colombia are the children between 5 and 14 years old. Many displaced children are at risk of desnutrition, lack access to school and are forced to work to bring money at home.
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• Right to return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity
  
  The Colombian government has prioritized individual return as a long term solution to forced displacement, without giving guarantee in most of the cases of voluntarily, safety and dignity. “While conditions are not yet in place for overall mass returns, a limited number of the displaced have returned to their places of origin.
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• The right to health
  
  Many displaced persons suffer from illnesses or are at risk of contract one without having the opportunity to access adequate health care (medical, preventative, and mental). This situation constitutes a violation of the Guiding principles 18 and 19.
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• Right to life, integrity and freedom
  
  Human rights violations such as massacres, forced disappearances, killings, torture and death threats continue to be massive and systematic in Colombia. Between July 2002 and June 2006, an average of seven people (7,8) have been killed or forcibly disappeared out of combat for sociopolitical reasons every day.
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• Right to land and the protection and restitution of properties
  
  One of the causes of forced displacement in Colombia is the interest of companies, land owners and the government itself for the territory and the control of natural resources.
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• The right of an adequate standard of living (food, shelter, water, clothing, health)
  
  In Colombia, displaced people are the poorest among the poor population. The majority of them look for refuge to protect their life in marginalized areas of the big cities where they often do not access to adequate food and public services such as drinking water, adequate shelter and health.
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• The rights to the truth, justice and reparation
  
  In Colombia, impunity is one of the principal impediments to reach a long term solution for displaced people. “Although forced displacement is a crime under Colombian law, allegedly less than 1 per cent of all criminal cases are prosecuted under this crime. In most cases, it is examined in connection with other crimes under Colombian criminal law and not on its own.
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• The right to respect of family life
  
  Displacement has the effect of eroding traditional family structures, particularly when male members of the family have been killed, have disappeared or have been compelled to seek safety or work elsewhere.
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