A group of mothers in Colombia whose sons were murdered by the military in 2008 are suing former President Alvaro Uribe for slander after he posted on his Twitter feed that the sons were criminals, according to news reports Monday.
Uribe was commander in chief of the military when it carried out operations which came to be known as the “false positives” scandal – when the military executed thousands of Colombians, dressed them in guerrilla garb and reported them as guerrillas killed in combat. They did this in order to receive financial benefits and to inflate the military’s success in the battle against the insurgents.
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The mothers, from the central Colombian city of Soacha, filed a lawsuit Friday against Uribe for suggesting that their sons – who were victims of this practice – were somehow involved in criminal activity.
“He marks our sons as thugs while he never knew them,” Marila Ubilerma Sanabria, whose 16-year-old son was killed, told Caracol News.
“They were killed by the state … By people who supposedly protect us, but instead are killing us,” the woman added.
According to past criminal investigations, the Soacha victims were told that they had been selected for a job but then were delivered to and executed by members of the Colombian Army's 15th brigade. They were then buried in a mass grave and filed as guerrillas in combat.
Uribe, however, said the men “were not going to pick coffee. They went with criminal purposes.”
After Uribe reportedly met with the Soacha mothers in June, he subsequently tweeted that “some told me that their sons unfortunately were involved in illegal activity, which does not justify assassinations but the hypothesis has not been tested by justice.”
5. Reunión con las madres de Soacha. pic.twitter.com/p5QFflZ6Ss
— Álvaro Uribe Vélez (@AlvaroUribeVel)
June 25, 2015
Meeting with the mothers of Soacha.
The mothers deny making such statements and said the former president's comments paint their sons in a negative light and that their murders were somehow justified.
“He (Uribe) has re-victimized our children as he wanted and has treated them as criminals. We, as parents, we are here to defend them ... we have to defend their good name, for they are not criminals,” Maria Sanabria, one of the mothers of Soacha, told Colombia magazine Semana.
According to a 2014 study by the University of Sabana, the number of “false positive” cases increased by 154 percent while Uribe was in office (2002-2010), reported Semana.
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The former president is already undergoing a Supreme Court investigation for his alleged involvement in a paramilitary massacre during his time as governor of the state of Antioquia (1995-1997).
Uribe has long been accused of being involved with paramilitaries – also known as death squads – particularly while governor of Antioquia, but which is also believed to have continued during his time as president.
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