Colombia: Social Leaders Denounce Violence at The Hague

Social leaders from Colombia will denounce on April 5, before the International Criminal Court (ICC), in The Hague, the systematic murders against them.

The complaint urges the Court to investigate and judge the killings of social leaders by the Colombian State. A crime that, they say, is maintained due to impunity.

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The senator and leader of the Colombian Human movement, Gustavo Petro, will be part of the delegation that will go to The Hague, in the Netherlands, to present the complaint.

"The Attorney General's Office does not have the will to investigate and given the attacks, in addition to the Special Justice of Peace there is no other recourse than to present ourselves before the International Criminal Court to request that they investigate crimes against humanity in Colombia", detailed.

The organization Somos Defensores de Colombia indicates that 91.4 percent of the murders of social leaders committed between 2009 and 2017 went unpunished. In fact, only 49 cases (8.6 percent) had a conviction or acquittal.

Between 2016 and 2019, 574 social leaders in Colombia have been murdered, according to data compiled by teleSUR and the human rights report "All names, all faces." The last victim was Argemiro López, communal leader of the village of La Guayacana, murdered on March 17, who headed projects on the substitution of illicit crops.