COLOMBIA: Children's Rights in the UN Special Procedures' Reports

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Summary: This report extracts mentions of children's rights issues in the reports of the UN Special Procedures. This does not include reports of child specific Special Procedures, such as the Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, which are available as separate reports.

Please note that the language may have been edited in places for the purpose of clarity.

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Requested visits

(R in 2008) SR on the right to food
(R 2008) IE on human rights and extreme poverty
(R in 2006) SR on adequate housing
(R in 2006 and 22 and 23/12/2010) WG on mercenaries

UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance

Doudou Diène

E/CN.4/2004/18/Add.3

Country visit: 27 September to 11 October 2003
Report published: 24 February 2004

Ethnic and racial dimension of the armed conflict:

The Special Rapporteur notes that:

As the Special Rapporteur on violence against women has already pointed out (E/CN.4/2002/83/Add.3, paras. 66-73), women, particularly indigenous and Afro-Colombian women, suffer most from the conflict and account for 48 per cent of displaced persons. Children between the ages of 5 and 14 are also severely affected and constitute 75 per cent of the displaced population. Aside from displacement per se, girls and women are victims of ill-treatment ranging from forced recruitment into illegal forces to rape and illegal confinement for domestic work. (para 49)
 

The Special Rapporteur recommends the establishment, as a matter of priority, of a national commission on displaced populations, which should have a double mandate: to conduct an in-depth study of the economic, social and security situation of the displaced populations and to propose solutions and measures to remedy problems that have been identified. Special attention should be given to the housing, health, working and education conditions of the displaced populations. The commission should comprise four elements: government representatives (particularly representatives of the principal ministerial departments concerned); members of the democratic opposition; representatives of the main human rights and civil society organizations; and representatives of the displaced populations. (para 51 c).

UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention

(A/HRC/10/21/Add.3)

Country visit: 1-10 October 2008
Report published: 16 February 2009

Detentions based on informant/ co-operators network: The Working Group heard allegations that prosecution was being used as a way of repressing certain categories of social worker, including municipal leaders, representatives of internally displaced persons, trade unionists, and journalists who are accused of slander and of making false criminal accusations. Particular concern was expressed for indigenous people, minors, pregnant women, female heads of household, immigrants and the poor. It is alleged that networks of security force informers who are paid have been set up for their information, as well as networks of unpaid collaborators. There were warnings of a policy of compensating those who provide information. Reintegrated guerrillas are forced to provide information, which often leads to detentions. (Paragraph 45)

False positive cases: Eight adults and one 17-year-old disappeared between January and August 2008 in Soacha, a slum area of the capital. Their bodies were buried in separate unmarked graves in the cemetery of Ocaña, Norte de Santander, 400 kilometres from Bogotá. Two other victims appeared in Cimitarra. It was claimed that they were guerrillas who were killed in combat. In fact, they were poor adolescents from a disadvantaged neighbourhood. It was obviously thought that their disappearance would go unnoticed. In the region of Bajo Ariari, the bodies of various disappeared campesinos were presented tens of kilometres away as guerrillas who had been killed in combat. The Working Group was informed that more than 3,000 members of the army are under investigation by the Office of the Attorney-General and the Office of the Procurator-General, some for cases of "false positives". (Paragraph 70).

Detention of children: The clinic received patients who had not been sent by the courts, but who had been brought by their families. In these cases the psychiatrist's report had been confirmed by the forensic medical expert. Any detainee who does not agree with their detention may apply for a writ of habeas corpus. The authorities declared that, sometimes, even when the doctors considered that patients were ready for release, their families refused to receive them and they had to remain in the clinic. (Paragraph 85).

In Bogotá, D.C., the Working Group visited the El Redentor Working School and, in Arauca, the Temporary Shelter for Young Offenders. The Group noted that the latter was a type of depot or warehouse with bars on the windows, with a warden on duty, where an 11-year-old girl was detained for possession of psychoactive substances. Children in trouble with the law, indigenous minors and destitute adolescents are commonly detained there. (Paragraph 86)

        Act No. 1098, the Children and Adolescents Code, has been in force in Colombia (but not yet in Bogotá) since 15 March 2007. The Act is an attempt to apply the principle of the best interests of the child as enshrined in international instruments and establishes a juvenile criminal justice system. The new Code is based on the premise that the minor is responsible and that the penalties imposed on minors should aim to rehabilitate, educate and protect. Under the new system, the police force for children and adolescents apprehends young offenders and brings them before the supervisory judge, accompanied by the Family Ombudsman, within 36 hours of their apprehension. Minors can be tried only from the age of 15 years. Minors aged 14 cannot be tried, found criminally responsible or deprived of liberty, but they are brought before a judge to answer for their actions. The penalty of supervised freedom can be imposed on them, with the commitment to present themselves periodically before the Colombian Family Welfare Institute (ICBF), or semi-confinement (where they attend a rehabilitation centre only in the daytime). (Paragraph 87)

        The majority of detained minors are in detention for the illegal possession of weapons, theft, drug trafficking, homicide, attempted homicide and personal injury. The maximum penalty that can be imposed on them is eight years for crimes against humanity, even though the maximum penalty under the old Minors' Code was only three years.13 The penalty can be reduced by half if the young offender pleads guilty to the charges. There is always the possibility of appealing to a hybrid court made up of criminal and family magistrates. The most common offences involving adolescents are theft, trafficking and possession of drugs and illegal possession of weapons. (Paragraph 88)

        Minors aged between 14 and 16 years may be deprived of liberty only if they have committed the offences of homicide, kidnapping or extortion. Minors aged between 16 and 18 years may be detained in establishments of the Colombian Family Welfare Institute (ICBF) only if they have committed offences warranting a sentence of six years' imprisonment (sexual abuse, domestic violence or aggravated theft). The new Children's Act is not yet in force in the department of Cundinamarca. (Paragraph 89)

        Between 15 March 2007 and 31 August 2008, 5,000 minors in Bogotá alone were processed through the Criminal Justice System for Adolescents for committing an offence. Of those, 200 are in pretrial detention and 100 have already been sentenced. (Paragraph 90).

         

        UN Special Rapporteur of the Secretary-General on the human rights of internally displaced people, Walter Kalin

        (A/HRC/4/38/Add.3)

        Country visit: 15-27 June 2006
        Report published: 24 January 2007

        • Recruitment of children and forced displacement: The reasons for forced displacement in Colombia are multiple and complex. They include the lack of respect for civilians by various armed groups; the multiplication of armed actors and criminal activities in the wake of the recent demobilisation process; the forced recruitment of children by armed groups; threats and pressures to collaborate with the armed groups; and assassinations of community leaders who were perceived as spearheading the resistance to the various pressures suffered by their communities. (Paragraph 13)
        • Women and children/ displacement: Women are important victims of displacement. They informed the 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. There were also cases of young girls having to leave their communities because of forced sexual relations with members of the armed forces or armed groups. (Paragraph 15)
        • Recommendation: Concerning the particular situation of women, the Representative recommends: (a) The systematic study and analysis of sexual and gender-based violence issues for internally displaced women and girl-children in order to render them visible;(Paragraph 82)

         

        Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances

        (E/CN.4/2006/56/Add.1)

        Country visit: 5- 13 July 2005
        Report published: 17 January 2006

        Vice-Chairman-Rapporteur, J. Adebayo Adekanye, and Working Group member Santiago Corcuera.

        • Constitutional Protection: 25. Article 44 of the Constitution refers to the rights of children. It should be noted that, although a specific reference to enforced disappearance is not contained in this article, allusion is made to the fact that children should be protected against abandonment, kidnapping, sale, sexual abuse and labour exploitation, practices which are either implicit in or are frequently coupled with the crime of enforced disappearance.(Paragraph 25)
        • Cases of enforced disappearance: During the mission many cases of enforced disappearances were handed over to the Working Group. At the first stage of processing of the cases received in Colombia, the provisional figures indicate around 116 newly reported cases including three women and two children. (Paragraph 58)
        • Sexual violence: Another aspect of disappearances that has been underreported in the past and continues at the present time relates to the way in which acts of disappearance are perpetrated in conjunction with other gross violations, with targets drawn from among the most vulnerable groups in society. Numerous testimonies were received concerning these phenomena. The most common examples brought to our notice were: disappearances, combined with "social cleansing" (said to have been a marked feature of the practice in the city of Barrancabermeja for much of the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s, with the urban poor, the unemployed and the so-called "undesirables", including prostitutes, petty thieves, vagabonds, gamblers and homosexuals as the victims); disappearances, subsequently combined with executions (the victims being drawn mostly from among radical political party leaders or members and trade unionists suspected of collaborating with the guerrilla groups); disappearances, combined with enforced displacement (taking place often mostly in rural areas, the objective being to dispossess victims of their land and properties); disappearances, combined with rape and other forms of sexual violence (with women and girls as victims); disappearances, combined with forced conscription recruitment (directed at children). There seems to have been an increase in all of these practices since the Working Group's first mission to Colombia in 1988. (Paragraph 59)
        • Recommendation: The Government must in its protection and preventive strategy take urgent measures recognising the special needs of the country's most vulnerable groups,
          particularly women, children, human rights defenders, trade union leaders, the urban
          poor, rural dwellers and members of the indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities.. (Paragraph 111)

         

        Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people, Mr. Rodolfo Stavenhagen

        (E/CN.4/2005/88/Add.2)

        Country visits: 8 to 17 March 2004
        Report published: 10 November 2004

        • Executive summary:
        • The Special Rapporteur heard many accounts of the conflict currently gripping the country and its devastating effects on indigenous peoples: murder and torture, mass displacement, forced disappearance, forced recruitment of young people into combat units and rape of women, as well as occupation of their lands by guerrilla, paramilitary and other illegal armed groups.
        • Of particular concern are the devastating effects of the armed conflict on indigenous peoples, and the Special Rapporteur appeals for [...] the adoption of the measures needed to halt the recruitment of minors into armed groups.
        • III. Human Rights Situation of Indigenous People in Colombia: Priority Issues - A. The armed conflict in indigenous areas:
        • Reports have been received of several massacres that have occurred in indigenous areas in recent years; these massacres have been attributed to the paramilitaries, the guerrillas and other armed groups. [...] Some of the armed groups use home-made explosive devices and anti-personnel landmines to terrorize the population, with lethal results. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimates that 170 indigenous people were killed in this way in 2002. (para 28)
        • On the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, an area visited by the Special Rapporteur, the Kankuamo people (3,000 families, 13,000 people and 12 communities), who live inside the “black line” which marks the traditional boundary of their territory, are now in the process of reclaiming their indigenous identity. Their lands have been recognized, but no reserve has yet been established. Guerrilla groups started arriving in the 1980s and AUC set up a base there in the 1990s, with the result that the number of kidnappings and murders escalated to a level far above the rural and regional average, particularly from 1998 onwards. It was then that the massacres of indigenous people, the mass displacements, the blockades and the forced confinement of communities to their villages began. More than 300 families are reportedly still displaced as a result of attacks and threats of various kinds. [...] The Arhuaco people, who oppose the presence of armed groups on their territory, are fighting for the restoration of a “brotherhood zone” and for respect for their human and collective rights. The Special Rapporteur has received reports of violations such as [...] forced recruitment of young people [...] and other abuses. (para 31)
        • The situation of displaced people is particularly dire in certain urban areas, including Bogotá. The mayor of Valledupar informed the Special Rapporteur that there are high rates of malnutrition among displaced indigenous people, and even cases of children dying of hunger. The municipality does not have the resources to meet all the needs of the displaced indigenous population. Women heads of household and children suffer the worst consequences of involuntary displacement; many of the women resort to begging and a large number of the children live in the street. Yet, without reliable records, it is difficult to channel humanitarian aid appropriately. (para 35)
        • The psychological and social trauma such violence causes to the indigenous populations is incalculable. Children under 18, women and older people are at most risk. In late 2003, the media reported a series of suicides among Embera girls in the department of Chocó; these were attributed to the collective depression caused by the horrors of the armed conflict. (para 39)
        • In some areas it is reported that the armed groups block access to indigenous communities and seize their food and other supplies, which causes families great hardship. Several such blockades were reported to the Special Rapporteur in the Sierra Nevada and Amazon regions and elsewhere. Humanitarian aid and an end to blockades are urgently needed if these families are to survive with a minimum of food security and basic necessities, despite the armed conflict. However, the lack of security makes it difficult to get essential humanitarian aid to these communities, and to their worst affected members, the women and children. (para 42)
        • There are many reports of cases of forced recruitment of indigenous youths, and even children, by the armed groups. Although under Colombian law members of indigenous communities are exempt from compulsory military service, the army has nonetheless recruited indigenous youths, who allegedly volunteered, to peasant soldier units; and there are reports of cases of indigenous people enlisting, for a variety of reasons, in one of the rival armed factions. Such actions provoke reprisals against the families or the community as a whole, creating even greater insecurity and bringing further abuses and violations. (para 43)
        • B. Violence, drug trafficking and human rights:
        • The Awa community in Nariño has informed the Special Rapporteur of various kinds of damage caused over the last three years to large tracts of rainforest in several areas of the municipalities of Tumaco and Barbacoas, as a result of spraying with glyphosate. The greatest damage was done, they say, to sources of fresh water, killing native fish and affecting human health, causing aching bones, vomiting, dizziness, fever and other ailments, particularly among children. (para 51)
        • E. Situation of indigenous women:
        • The situation of indigenous women, who account for 49 per cent of the total indigenous population, is particularly worrying. To begin with, the few indicators available show that women’s level of human development (education, nutrition, health, etc.) is lower than that of indigenous men and of the non-indigenous population as a whole. At least 60 per cent of displaced women lack access to health services. Displaced children present high rates of malnutrition, respiratory diseases, diarrhoea and dehydration, and many of them are forced to migrate to urban areas to avoid recruitment by the armed groups. (para 70)
        • G. Extension of basic social services:
        • The Government of Colombia is committed to a social policy of support for indigenous peoples and for their development. The Constitution establishes a general subsidy scheme for the indigenous reserves; these resources are required by law to be directed primarily towards meeting basic needs in the areas of health, education, drinking water, agricultural development and housing. (para 75)
        • The law establishes the principle of indigenous bilingual and intercultural education, and shortly before the Special Rapporteur’s visit the Government announced that the public health service was to be extended and expanded to cover Colombia’s entire indigenous population. This is a major challenge, with many obstacles to overcome. The human, economic and social development indicators for the indigenous population show levels below the national average, particularly in respect of indigenous women and girls. According to a study by the Cauca Indigenous Regional Council, only 50 per cent of school-age children are actually in school, and in Antioquia the figure is less than 40 per cent. (para 76)
        • For bilingual education to become a reality for all indigenous school-age children in Colombia, a sustained effort will be required, along with extensive resources for, inter alia, teacher training, school construction, production of educational materials, evaluation of results and continuity of teaching methods, all of which are at present compromised by the constraints on the public purse and the various national priorities in resource allocation. (para 77)
        • The same applies to health services, particularly in the areas of mother-and-childcare, reproductive health for indigenous women, child nutrition (including among the displaced population) and cultural determinants of health among indigenous peoples. In this context, it is worrying to note that the armed conflict has claimed the lives of large numbers of traditional doctors from indigenous communities and that the violence has hampered communities’ ability to collect traditional plants and products in the natural environment for use in health care in accordance with indigenous cultural practice. The violence has also frightened off doctors and health workers and affected vaccination campaigns. (para 78)
        • The Embera Katio people of Alto Sinú informed the Special Rapporteur of their high mortality rate - more than twice the national rate; what is more, their infant mortality rate is 3.2 times the national rate. They are demanding better health care from the State and allege that there is no effective protection for their cultural integrity. (para 79)
        • IV. Conclusions:
        • Of particular concern are the conditions of indigenous people who have been internally displaced or who are refugees from the violence, in particular women and children. (para 84)
        • V. Recommendations - A. Recommendations to the Government - Internally displaced persons:
        • The displaced indigenous population, and women and children in particular, should be accorded priority attention by the State and international organizations. Women, particularly mothers, should receive special assistance. (para 92)
        • Indigenous women:
        • Existing programmes on the provision of basic social services should be extended so as to improve the situation of indigenous women and children in rural areas, and in particular displaced women and children, with regard to health and education. (para 98)
        • Military service:
        • Schemes for children and youngsters such as the network of informers, the introduction of peasant soldiers and the “soldiers for a day” programme should be discontinued. (para 101)
        • Sustainable development and basic social services:
        • As part of the plans for free education for all - which the State is under an obligation to provide - the bilingual and intercultural education programme should be reinforced in indigenous areas, and the role of private educational establishments should always be limited to supplementing the work of the State. (para 109)

         

        UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Ambeyi Ligabo

        (E/CN.4/2005/64/Add.3)

        Country visit: 22 to 29 February 2004
        Report published: 26 November 2004

        • Background: The Colombian army, paramilitary forces and guerrilla groups have carried on an uncompromising 40-year-old civil war without reprieve. Extrajudicial executions, use of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment and torture, forced disappearances, enforced displacement, hostage-taking, kidnapping and, last but not least, worsening poverty make Colombia a country in which free opinion and expression is a dangerous exercise. Human rights defenders, trade union leaders, Church dignitaries and media representatives are among the most common targets in the civil war. Owing to the complexity of the conflict, the simple fact of expressing opinions may expose the ordinary citizen to retaliation. Especially vulnerable groups are women, children, indigenous people and all those who, in the exercise of their right to freedom of opinion and expression, are perceived to get in the way of one of the parties to the conflict. (Paragraph 7)
        • Paramilitary groups/ militarisation of the countryside: Another crucial issue is the existence of paramilitary groups who are impinging on the life of many citizens, substantially hampering their freedom of expression. More should be done against these groups and all links between them and legitimate republican authorities and institutions should be cut. In this connection, the Special Rapporteur believes that the militarization of the countryside through the Soldado Campesino programme would only spread further fear and trouble among local populations, especially vulnerable groups like indigenous peoples, peasants, women and children. (Paragraph 80)

         

        Special Rapporteur on the right to education, Katarina Tomaševski

        (E/CN.4/2004/45/Add.2)

        Country visits: 1 to 10 October 2003
        Report published: 17 February 2004

        • Summary:
        • The dearth of up-to-date, disaggregated statistics on all exclusion criteria makes it hard to gauge the number and profile of the children whose right to education is still being denied. In addition, discrimination, with the exception of sex discrimination, continues to go unrecorded. The Special Rapporteur recommends that an up-to-date profile of educational exclusion be drawn up with a view to taking the necessary steps to bring about full inclusion as soon as possible. Ensuring that education is actually free necessitates a detailed breakdown of the costs borne by pupils for whom education should be free but is not, and the Special Rapporteur recommends a study of current costs with a view to eliminating them.
        • Introduction:
        • The purpose of the Special Rapporteur’s mission from 1 to 10 October 2003 was to investigate in situ the right to education. [...] Additionally, she had meetings with international organizations working in the field of human rights and education in Colombia, [...] and associations of university teachers and students. During her visit, the Special Rapporteur learned of a large number of cases of violation of the right to education and of human rights in education. She talked with teachers who had been threatened or raped, parents unable to pay for their children’s education - which should be free but is not - and university students who have been threatened on account of their human rights work. (para 2)
        • I. Context: ''The Right to the Right'':
        • The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) stressed that the Government’s proposals and actions “reflect what has been termed a ‘pedagogical thrust’, i.e. they provide lessons of various sorts that help to build citizenship”.66 The Special Rapporteur recommends that the Government make an immediate and explicit commitment to defend and protect human rights defenders. (para 6)
        • It is important to remember that the preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights calls attention to the fact that these rights “should be protected by the rule of law”. But the right to education is not afforded such protection. [...] If children’s right to education is not protected, they will be left without an effective safeguard. In the vast majority of cases there is a lack of available and accessible schooling for children of school age, which is a violation of the right to education, yet nobody is held to account for the situation. Constitutional protection is still an effective (in fact the sole) remedy. On 30 July 2003 the Constitutional Court registered its “profound and complete disagreement” with the proposed constitutional reform. The Special Rapporteur recommends that the Colombian State confirm, immediately and explicitly, that its international human rights obligations are fully observed, and that it commit itself to strengthening the protection of economic, social and cultural rights. (para 8)
        • II. Educational Dysfunction:
        • The dual status of education in Colombian law - public and private, free and fee-paying - has created a good deal of confusion. In addition, the Government’s education policies weaken the right to education because free, compulsory public education for school-age children is not guaranteed as a bare minimum. The Special Rapporteur thinks it is important to emphasize, as she does in every annual report, the difference between education as a commodity and education as a human right. The extension of the market approach to education can improve education statistics, but if access is pegged to ability to pay, education cannot be spoken of as a human right. (para 10)
        • The economic changes, known as “sweat and tears”, have posed new challenges for human rights defenders because the Government’s economic policy contains no proposals to safeguard the right to education. Three proposals on education funding were rejected in the referendum of 25 October 2003. Two of the proposals sought to boost resources for education through savings and revenue grants, while the third proposed a public-sector pay freeze (including teachers’ pay). The protection of human rights necessitates a preliminary study of the impact that such initiatives might have, with a view to excluding (or at least minimizing) any undesirable effects. Since their inception, human rights have served as an indispensable corrective mechanism in all democratic measures. Children, the prime bearers of the right to education, are not entitled to vote. Consequently, their right to education is protected by the rule of the law. (para 11)
        • The National Development Plan 2002-2006 makes the “education revolution” a priority in the social sphere. The principal objectives are to increase coverage (to 1.5 million places in basic education and 400,000 places in higher education) and improve the quality and efficiency of education. More than half of these extra places in basic education (800,000) will be created through restructuring (merging of educational institutions and increasing the ratio of pupils to teachers and classrooms) without an increase in funding. The other half were to have been financed through savings, as proposed in the referendum. Following the rejection of the proposals in the referendum, the Government “is looking at alternative ways of finding the resources that were envisaged”. [...] The Development Plan 2002-2006 does not mention the right to education, nor does it provide for a strategy to extend free education or reduce education costs. Quite the reverse, it espouses the principle of co-financing by families and students, thereby shifting the State’s human rights obligations on to private individuals. [...] Colombia does not have a rights-based education strategy, and the Special Rapporteur recommends that a study be undertaken of the impact of the “education revolution” on the right to education. (para 12)
        • A. “Public schools here operate like private schools”:
        • The core tenets of the right to education include the guarantee that primary education is to be compulsory and free of charge for all children of school age, the guarantee of the principle of non-discrimination as regards the right to education and human rights in education, and the prevention of abuses by defining the objectives and scope of schooling in accordance with international human rights law. (para 13)
        • Colombian children ask for “free, non-elitist education”, referring to the six socio-economic strata ranging from 1, the lowest, to 6, the highest, and the exclusion and fragmentation that are the result of the system of fee-paying education. This education system is “a recipe for perpetuating poverty and inequality” because it reproduces economic and social stratification. A fragmented system of education mirrors a fragmented society. The poorest strata, 1 and 2, account for less than 5 per cent of total income, whereas strata 5 and 6 account for 60 per cent. Family income is the fundamental determining factor in the education of children and young people, particularly higher education, with enrolment of “less than 6 per cent of young people from stratum 1 aged between 18 and 24”. The gap between rich and poor is illustrated by the fact that, on average, young people from strata 1 and 2 spend less than 5.7 years in the education system, compared with over 11 years for stratum 6, and by the fact that, in Bogotá, “42.5 per cent of young people from the lower strata are active in the labour market, compared with just 3.7 per cent in the higher strata”. (para 16)
        • The Education Development Plan for 2003-2006 sets out three priorities for the population aged between 5 and 18, namely extending coverage, improving quality, and improving the efficiency of education. The changes are similar to the education policies pursued by Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the 1980s (E/CN.4/2000/6/Add.2, paras. 13-16). These placed emphasis on “educational output”, the hiring of private education companies, testing, evaluation of teachers according to their students’ success in examinations, and resource allocation based on results rather than costs. Subsidies enabling certain poor pupils to pay private school fees (“demand-driven subsidies”) are also modelled on the British system from the 1980s: “Demand-driven subsidies are intended to benefit children from low-income backgrounds […] These students will be placed in private schools with high quality standards. The recipients will be able to pay the school fees.” (para 18)
        • B. “Eat or go to school”:
        • The Government’s foremost obligation is to guarantee primary education for all children, which requires considerable investment. Children of school age are the prime bearers of the right to education. Although the Government need not be the sole investor in education, international human rights law nevertheless requires that the lion’s share of investment should originate from the State. The right to education cannot be translated into reality when there is a shortage of school places or if schools simply do not exist. The State has a duty to provide free, compulsory education that precludes all exclusion. (para 21)
        • Persons with inadequate access to education pass on this legacy to the next generation. The policy of making families and local communities financially responsible for education widens the gap between the haves, the have-nots and the have-nothings (such as the very numerous victims of forced displacement). To break this vicious circle, the Government must prioritize and provide funds for universal-free education. The history of the right to education shows that compulsory schooling is not feasible unless education is free of charge. In Colombia, the volume of public and private investment in education is equal, with both representing about 4 per cent of GDP. Thus there are two parallel education systems in Colombia: poor education for the poor and expensive private education for the rich. About 30 per cent of all pupils attend private primary schools, 45 per cent attend private secondary schools and 75 per cent attend fee-paying tertiary educational institutions. This accentuates educational differences attributable to family wealth or poverty, and indicates that pre-school and tertiary education are the privilege of those in the higher income bracket. (para 22)
        • The Ministry of Education is budgeting 1 million pesos (US$ 365) per pupil per year. The cost of compulsory public education in Bogotá includes an enrolment fee of between US$ 15 and US$ 30, the cost of school uniforms and equipment varying between US$ 19 and US$ 52, to which must be added costs associated with transport (approximately US$ 15 a month), school books and meals. According to CCJ, the average cost per pupil is 1,080,000 pesos a year or three times the minimum monthly wage, which is beyond the means of the poorest strata of society. (para 24)
        • The Special Rapporteur was informed about the cost of enrolment fees, which should be waived but are not. In Chocó, the poorest department in the country, she was told that “free education is a sham”. Enrolment and other fees at the primary-school level vary between 30,000 and 150,000 pesos, and at the secondary-school level between 120,000 and 250,000 pesos. In Bogotá, displaced children are excused payment of fees in their first year of school, but the following year they must pay an enrolment fee of 85,000 pesos. The education authorities’ power to assess a family’s capacity to pay confronts people with a cruel choice: either eat or go to school. (para 25)
        • According to the World Bank, Colombia is the only country in the region where primary education is not free.25 The Colombian Constitution provides that public education is free (for 10 years, from age 5 to 15) “without prejudice to the possibility of charging school fees to those able to pay”. This guarantee can be interpreted in two ways. One interpretation is that free education is just a subsidy for those otherwise unable to pay; the other regards free education as an integral part of the right to education. The first interpretation defines education as a responsibility that is shared between the State and the family, while the second treats it as the responsibility of the State. (para 26)
        • The Special Rapporteur recommends that the Colombian State should immediately and explicitly reaffirm its international obligation to ensure free education for all children of compulsory school age. The implementation of the cost-free principle requires a detailed breakdown of the costs incurred by pupils for education that ought to be free but is not. The Special Rapporteur further recommends that a study be undertaken of the actual costs involved with a view to abolishing them. (para 28)
        • III. The Profile of Exclusion:
        • Although the Educación Compromiso de Todos team has criticized the education statistics for being unfocused, out of date and contradictory depending on the source that provides them, statistics for children in school nevertheless exist, although there are no statistics for children who should be attending school but are not. Their number is estimated at between 1.5 and 3.3 million. The exact population of Colombia is unknown. Reliable data are lacking. Estimates are based on population projections compiled by the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE), which are themselves based on the most recent census from 1993. National coverage of civil registration of births was 81.6 per cent in 2000,31 but still fails to cover the entire indigenous, rural, poor and displaced child population. The number of displaced persons is not known; it is estimated that 2.9 million people have been victims of forced displacement since 198532 and at least 1 million school-aged children have been displaced. The Special Rapporteur recommends that the Government make an immediate commitment to free education and to subsidizing the full range of educational services for all displaced children of school age. The lack of up-to-date, disaggregated statistics for all exclusion criteria makes it hard to gauge the number and profile of the children whose right to education is still being denied. The Special Rapporteur recommends that an up-to-date profile of educational exclusion be prepared immediately with a view to adopting all necessary measures to ensure full inclusion as soon as possible. (para 29)
        • Accessibility is defined in different ways according to the stage of education involved. It is the duty of the Government to provide compulsory education for all children of school age. The right to education should be implemented gradually by making it easier to gain access to education after the compulsory phase, as far as circumstances permit, while at the same time ensuring that human rights are given priority in the use of all available resources. The fact that military spending takes priority over social investment in Colombia is illustrated by the increase in military spending from 3.5 to 5.8 per cent of GDP in 2006, notwithstanding the constitutional obligation to give priority to public-sector social investment over any other kind of spending. (para 31)
        • The level of budget funding for education is insufficient to guarantee universal primary education, or to guarantee universal compulsory education from the age of 9. According to calculations by the National Planning Department (DNP), school enrolment rates in 2000 were 40.5 per cent in pre-school education, 83.6 per cent in primary education, 62.6 per cent in secondary education and 15.1 per cent in tertiary education. Approximately 35 per cent of students enrol but drop out in the first few years, the majority because they cannot afford to continue. The Special Rapporteur recommends an increase of 30 per cent in budget spending on education, or from 4 to 6 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP). (para 32)
        • Prior to the affirmation of the right to education, work was in many cases the only form of “education” (in the sense of training for work) that poor children received. Child labour continues to exist owing to poverty and the need for children to work in order to survive. There is little explicit mention of the Government’s human rights-based response to child labour, despite the fact that, according to UNICEF, “there are approximately 2.5 million children aged between 9 and 17 working in Colombia”. According to DANE, there are 2.3 million child workers aged between 5 and 17 in the country: 5 per cent of children aged between 5 and 9 and 30 per cent of children aged between 15 and 17 work, and 52 per cent of all children work without pay. One obstacle to using education in the fight against child labour is education policy itself, according to which there is no type of “preference”, education being a right for all. However, this general approach is unfair because programmes are inflexible and not targeted at populations with specific characteristics such as child workers. The Special Rapporteur recommends that the Government make an immediate commitment to free education, subsidizing the full range of educational services for all child workers of school age and, moreover, adapting education to these children’s needs, having sought their input in the design and assessment of such programmes. (para 33)
        • IV. Chocó: "Let Us Be Different":
        • Accessibility subsumes various government obligations. Education as a civil and political right requires the Government to permit the establishment of schools and universities, while education as a social and economic right requires the Government to ensure that education is free, compulsory and accessible - as a bare minimum - for all children of school age. (para 35)
        • V. Murders of Teaching Staff:
        • The right to education involves five key players: the Government, as the provider and/or sustainer of public education; the individual, as the possessor of the right to education; children, who must undergo compulsory education; parents, as first educators; and lastly professional educators, i.e. teaching staff. Although Colombia has an extensive legal apparatus to protect human rights, the right to education lacks a proper legal context in which the rights of all key stakeholders can be protected. (para 39)
        • VI. Aims and Objectives of Education:
        • In 1991 Juan Francisco Aguilar Soto described the disconnect between education inside and outside the classroom: “Knowledge acquired in the classroom is divorced from knowledge gained outside it, i.e. there is a disconnect between the contents of the school curriculum, the form in which this content is ‘transmitted’ by teachers, and general knowledge, the system of values, beliefs, knowledge and customs of importance in daily life, which in Colombia embraces a broad social and cultural spectrum.” (para 43)
        • Furthermore, students are exposed to conflicting influences within school itself: “Students face a dilemma: their teachers set great store by high achievement, yet their peers value mediocrity. When children reach adolescence, the peer group takes on central importance and, except for a handful of very intelligent individuals, most students swallow the opinion of their peers that it is foolish to do more than is necessary to get by. Studies of secondary schools clearly indicate that academic success does not cause children to be accepted by their peers. (para 44)
        • Forty years of conflict in Colombia raise questions about the impact of violence on the right to education. Data supplied by human rights organizations for the year 2002 reveal the gravity of the situation: on average, 20 people die every day as a result of socio-political violence and 13 are arbitrarily detained. An average of 1,623 people are forced to take flight every day, one family every 10 minutes,50 and according to the Ombudsman, every day in 2001 an average of 11 minors aged under 18 died a violent death. (para 46)
        • The task of socializing children against a backdrop of violence and military operations imposes enormous demands on education. In the words of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, the fact that “many Colombians are indifferent to violence” because they “accept the conflict as a part of life” (E/CN.4/2002/83/Add.3, para. 11) has a devastating impact on children. Ana Ofelia, a 10-year-old indigenous girl, has said that: “We children want to see joy in the eyes of our parents, brothers and sisters, not the hidden fear we see now, the fear that at any moment they could be mistreated, kidnapped or killed.” The application filed by one student, Yeny María Osuna Montes, who sought to take out an injunction ordering the removal of the police unit that had turned her school into a battlefield, stated that: “We live in insecurity and a state of tension, knowing that we are being used as human shields by the police unit at our backs.” According to the Ministry of the Interior, “the Government is prepared to bury the past”. But how can all of the past be explained to children? The Special Rapporteur spoke with four secondary-school children, who told her that “nothing is said about it; it is hidden”, even though girls have been raped or their teachers murdered, or “some girls were forced to endure a living death, i.e. abused to such an extent that they felt they were dead”. It would seem to be important to explain to children what has happened. Obviously, the lack of protection for the human rights of teachers and pupils alike makes this hard to do. (para 47)
        • Most of the teaching staff at the pre-school, primary and middle school levels are women (66.6 per cent in 1990). The majority of the combatants are men. It is possible that education in Colombia will continue to perpetuate a reverse gender imbalance, with a shortage of male teachers and, in the future, of male students. A preliminary analysis by the Special Rapporteur has confirmed the need for a gender-based approach in studying the extent to which education influences the socialization of children in their role as combatants, and the part played by education in triggering armed conflicts (E/CN.4/2001/52, paras. 46-47). Colombia’s schools are the target of attacks by armed groups, but they also play a role in “training for war”: “The army and the police have intervened in a number of schools in impoverished areas to conduct exercises in military strategy and ‘psychological operations’ among the civilian population; in these schools they organize training and military instruction and establish bases for security operations.” The Special Rapporteur recommends that a clear separation should be maintained between schools and the conflict, and that schools should be identified and protected as a “zone of peace” in order to rebuild the lives of children and young people who are prey to violence and forced displacement. (para 48)
        • Schools are also a recruiting ground. As one teacher put it to the Special Rapporteur, what can she say, on her salary of 300,000 pesos, to a 16-year-old student earning 800,000 pesos as a combatant? As children say, “if young people had more attractive educational and lifestyle alternatives and opportunities, the recruitment of child soldiers could be avoided”. The Special Rapporteur is concerned that the national agreement on equality between the sexes signed on 14 October 2003 refers to “women peacemakers” under the National Development Plan 2003-2006, but contains no commitment in this area, despite the crucial importance of peacemaking in Colombia. The Special Rapporteur recommends the adoption of a gender-based education strategy with a view to studying educational processes from the viewpoint of both sexes and developing a style of education opposed to conflict and violence, one that promotes the concept of a peaceful society based on equal human rights for all. (para 49)
        • VII. Human Rights Through Education: "What Concept of Gender?":
        • Colombian education statistics show that an equal number of girls and boys enrolled in primary and secondary schools, with a higher proportion of female students in tertiary education. The World Bank observed that the gender approach as an analytical model is disadvantageous to the male sex, because boys perform worse in education and are “disproportionate victims of violent death because of both the armed conflict and crime”. (para 51)
        • Of central importance in human rights is the nature of the education imparted. Access to education is not the only subject of concern. The key question in education is: who is responsible for defining what is to be taught and how it is to be taught? The State turns teacher insofar as it has the power to set the curriculum. Unlike many other countries, in May 2002 Colombia had national curriculum standards applicable to language, mathematics, natural sciences and environmental education. The process of developing these standards includes human rights as a component of “civic competence”, and the Special Rapporteur reiterates her recommendation to the Government that it should clarify the legitimacy of human rights and develop its education system with the full involvement of human rights defenders, teaching personnel and students to adapt the education process to the Colombian context. However, the Special Rapporteur continues to be concerned by the lack of information on how these curriculum standards are applied: “[The curriculum standards] are not widely known, and therefore, except in the academic timetable, they are not required to be enforced on a permanent basis. (para 52)
        • Colombia is the only country in the region where teenage pregnancy is on the increase, from 10 per cent in 1990 to 19 per cent in 2000. The suspension of sex education, reproductive health and family planning programmes could account for this (E/CN.4/2002/83/Add.3, para. 31). Moreover, despite the established view of the Constitutional Court that expulsion from school by reason of pregnancy is a violation of the right to education, school rules contain stipulations such as the following: “Pregnancy is cause for expulsion, given that it offends morality and damages the good name of the institution.” The Special Rapporteur cited previous decisions of the Constitutional Court (E/CN.4/2000/6, para. 60) as a model for the protection of the right to education and also as a means of influencing public human rights education. She recommends that the Government immediately develop mechanisms to ensure the effectiveness of efforts to eliminate all discrimination against pregnant girls and child-mothers, as called for by the Constitutional Court. (para 53)
        • For education to be adaptable, schools must adjust to children’s needs in accordance with the principle of the best interests of every child, as enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child. This change ended the practice of forcing children to adapt to whatever school was offered to them. Human rights being indivisible, the requirement of adaptability means that all human rights must be protected within the education system and also improved through education. (para 54)

         

        Special Representative of the Secretary-General on human rights defenders, Ms Hina Jilani

        (E/CN.4/2002/106/Add.2)

        Country visits: 23 to 31 October 2001
        Report published: 24 April 2002

        Introduction: In addition to meetings with representatives of United Nations agencies and the international community, the Special Representative met with a wide range of human rights NGOs and a great variety of actors representing human rights defenders, in particular [...] university teachers, students [...]. (para 5)

        B. Legal framework - 1. International obligations:

        Colombia has assumed a range of obligations deriving from international instruments in the area of human rights, notably those contained in the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It should be underlined that Colombia made no reservations upon acceding to these instruments. (para 20)

        II. Main Findings and Concerns - A. Violations of the fundamental rights of human rights defenders - 1. Violation of the right to life and personal integrity-

        (a) Killing of human rights defenders:

        All categories of human rights defenders are affected by summary and extrajudicial executions: (including) [...] students [...]. (para 48)

        (b) Death threats received by human rights defenders:

        The Special Representative’s attention was drawn to the fact that death threats from paramilitaries are being received by all sectors of the civil society, including [...] students. (para 64)

        2. Harassment and intimidation - (b) Type and origin of threats received:

        The Special Representative would like to stress the vulnerability of human rights defenders whose families are being attacked because of the work of the husband, father, brother, spouse, mother or sister. In this regard, she raised another case with the Government in an urgent appeal sent on 15 June 2001 in which Astrid Manrique Carnaval, member of Popayan Branch of the ASFADDES, and her family were threatened several times by unidentified men. On 3 June 2001, it was reported that two men smashed all the windows of Ms. Carnaval’s house and that she, together with her 14-year-old daughter, was followed by six unidentified men in the street. (para 88)

        4. Groups most affected by human rights violations - (a) Trade unionists:

        According to the information received, the constant threats and killings of trade unionists has led to the dissolution of 14 union organizations in the last five years. In addition, attacks against families of trade unionists have also been reported. [...] According to the information received, a pamphlet published on 5 May 2000 reported that a paramilitary offensive would soon take place in Bogotá and announced the imminent execution of various persons, including Mr. González. In addition, Mr. González’ daughter has reportedly been threatened and followed by members of military intelligence. It was also reported that during the year 2000, Mr. González, his daughter and his wife were called upon to testify before the Fiscal. (para 114)

        (c) Internally displaced persons:

        Cases received by the Special Representative illustrate the vulnerability of IDPs to threats and attacks. The leaders of the displaced are particularly exposed and are frequently victims of threats and aggression, including torture and assassination. Eder Encizo Sandoval, leader of a community of displaced persons in La Reliquia (Villavicencio, Meta), was reportedly killed on 19 August 2001 in the presence of 600 children and other community members. The identity of the perpetrators has yet to be established. (para 131)

        (d) Women:

        Colombia has a broad legal framework for the protection of women’s rights. Nevertheless, their situation remains difficult, especially owing to the effects of violence and armed conflict. [...] According to the information received, 50 per cent of the displaced population in Colombia are women and those in rural areas are particularly vulnerable to forced displacement. Among the reasons for this is that women fear that their minor children will be recruited for the war. In addition, the deterioration of the economic situation of the country primarily affects the female population. (para 138)

        The Special Representative received tragic testimonies of women being raped, tortured, threatened, killed, forcibly displaced and exiled. Cases of women forced to drink the blood of their own children and husbands were reported to the Special Representative. Women often suffer these violations either because they are the wives, mothers or sisters of a human rights defender, or because they are human rights defenders themselves. (para 139)

        The women’s organizations which are the hardest hit on an ongoing basis are those that work in rural areas and in the regions in which the armed conflict is more intense. Such is the case of ANMUCIC, the National Association of Peasant, Indigenous and Black Women of Colombia. The Special Representative has been informed that in the last four years, about 30 of its leaders have been killed, some of them along with their husbands or children. (para 140)

        (f) Teachers and university professors:

        Eder Enciso Sandoval, schoolteacher and leader of the displaced people in the settlement La Reliquia in the town of Villavicencio (Meta), was reportedly killed on 19 August 2001 while he was conducting a public event in the school to raise funds. Two other people were reportedly injured: Marleny Coronado Gómez, Vice-President of the Junta de Acción Comunal of the settlement, and a child. (para 156)

        (g) Students:

        The Special Representative was provided with information according to which the Universities of Antioquia, Córdoba, Atlántico, Cauca and Valle as well as the University of Surcolombiana in Neiva are the ones most affected by killing and threatening of students, teachers and employees. Incursions of paramilitaries into the universities have reportedly worsened since 1999. Between 1999 and 2001, seven students were killed in Colombia. In addition, student organizations are closing down because their leaders are being killed and their members are also often forcibly displaced. (para 160)

        The Special Representative was told that on 11 October 2001, Camilo Alberto Zuiluagha Echeverri, a student at the University of Tolima and student representative at the human rights committee of the university, was murdered, allegedly by paramilitaries, as he was taking part in a delegation established to look for disappeared persons. The incident took place between Dolores and Prado municipalities. In the same incident Marcos Antonio Martinez, member of the peace thematic commission of Tolima, and Hugo Melo, a trade union activist, were injured. Jesus Arias, who was part of the DAS escort assigned to protect Marcos Martinez, was also killed. The incident occurred at a place located half an hour by car from a police station. (para 161)

        The Special Representative has also been informed of the case of Diodedit Navarro Jaramillo, a student activist who was murdered on 10 August 1997, following the creation of a movement set up by members of the University community affiliated with the university professors union (ASPU) to fight corruption. In addition, it was reported that Luis Mesa Almanza, a lawyer and graduate of Atlántico University, was murdered on 26 August 2000 while leaving a meeting during which he had discussed with students and professors the latest demonstration organized by Atlántico University students. (para 162)

        During the year 1999, workers, teachers and students in Colombia organized a series of special days dedicated to the fight against administrative corruption and against the implementation of the National Development Plan which would privatize public education in Colombia, thereby affecting numerous students from disadvantaged sectors of society. Since then repressive measures have been taken by the State authorities leading to an increase in the number of murders, disappearances, threats, displacements and detentions of students leaders. Paramilitary groups called the Autodefensas Estudiantiles within the Colombian universities have been participating in the repression of the student movement. (para 163)

        (h) Health professionals:

        The Special Representative sent several communications to the Government of Colombia with regard to ANTHOC members. On 29 June 2001, she transmitted a joint urgent appeal with the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions regarding Emma Gómez de Perdono, a member of ANTHOC in Honda city (Tolima), and her daughter, Diana de Perdono, who were reportedly victims of a murder attempt by paramilitaries on 13 June 2001. (para 166)

        C. Major sources of violence committed against human rights defenders - 1. Responsibility of the State -

        (a) Responsibility of the police:

        During her visit to Colombia, the Special Representative was provided with various reports of violations of human rights for which the State was responsible. A certain number of cases of violations of the right to life and the right to physical integrity can be attributed to the police, who, for instance, caused deaths by means of excessive force or negligence. The Special Representative learned of incidents during student demonstrations at the University of Valle, the University of Nariño and the National University where a medical student was killed. (para 222)

        2. Responsibility of the guerrillas:

        The Special Representative was informed that between January and October 2000, according to reports from the Ministry of Defence, 164 of 671 recorded victims of massacres died at the hands of the guerrillas (E/CN.4/2001/15, para. 89). Indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities and their leaders are particularly targeted by the guerrillas. [...]The FARC allegedly threatens leaders who speak out against guerrillas in local and international forums. They also forcibly recruit minors from these communities. (para 243)

         

        Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, Ms Radhika Coomaraswamy

        (E/CN.4/2002/83/Add.3)

        Country visits: 1 to 7 November 2001
        Report published: 11 March 2002

        Executive summary: The Special Rapporteur calls on all parties to the conflict to take measures to protect women and girls from rape and other forms of gender-based violence, including instructing all warring factions to respect international humanitarian law. Rape, forced contraception and sterilization, forced prostitution, sexual slavery and other forms of sexual violence are serious breaches of international humanitarian law.

        The Special Rapporteur urges all parties to abide by and ensure enforcement of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. She reiterates the need to implement fully the recommendations made by the Representative of the Secretary General on internally displaced persons to the Government of Colombia and armed groups in Colombia. These include paying special attention to the particular needs of women and children, who make up the majority of the displaced population.

        The Special Rapporteur asks for the development and implementation of programmes for the social reintegration of former female combatants. The support provided to girl former combatants should include evaluating their past experiences. If these experiences are denied or treated as social maladjustment, or managed with guilt and resentment, these girls are denied the possibility of understanding their experiences within a political and historical context and of coming to terms with them.

        II. General Findings:

        With few avenues for social mobility, this situation provided a natural constituency for left-wing insurgents. At the other end of the political spectrum are right-wing paramilitary groups, who are sometimes in the pay of drug traffickers and large landowners, and are allegedly backed by elements in the army and the police. The paramilitaries have sprung up everywhere, in particular in the north-western regions, and target human rights workers and peasants suspected of helping left-wing guerrillas, street children and other marginal groups. (para 9)

        According to one report, some 300 armed men belonging to the paramilitary Peasant Self-Defence Force of Córdoba and Urabá (Autodefensas Campesinas de Córdoba y Urabá) (ACCU) set up a kangaroo court in the village of El Salado, Bolívar. Over the next two days, they tortured, garrotted, stabbed, decapitated and shot residents; investigators tied one 6-year-old girl to a pole and suffocated her with a plastic bag; one woman was reportedly gang-raped; 36 people were confirmed dead and another 30 were missing. In another case, paramilitaries entered the village of Pueblo Nuevo Mejía and abducted a woman and her son when they were unable to find her husband and brother-in-law; the woman was made to cook for the paramilitaries, ill-treated and threatened with sexual abuse. Other information indicated that guerrilla forces have been responsible for widespread abuses during the armed conflict, including numerous deliberate and arbitrary executions of people they consider to be military or paramilitary collaborators or sympathizers, including young women associating with members of the security forces. (para 10)

        The guerrilla groups have also committed serious violations of international humanitarian law in targeting the civilian population suspected of being associated with the paramilitaries or the Colombian armed forces. [...] They are the principal perpetrators in the conflict of abduction and forced recruitment of children, infringement of women’s reproductive rights and kidnapping for extortion purposes. (para 14)

        A. Status of women in Colombia:

        Sexual violence in Colombia is also a matter of special concern. In 1995, the Institute of Legal Medicine of Colombia issued 11,970 opinions in investigations of sexual crimes nationwide. Of the victims, 88 per cent were women, for a rate of 34 women per 100,000 population. According to the information received, it is estimated that there are some 775 cases of rape of adolescents annually, and that the rate of rape for this age group is 3.5 per 1,000 women. Nonetheless, only 17 per cent of the victims denounce such acts. It should be noted that of all such attacks on women over 20 years of age, 47 per cent are by relatives. (para 30)

        III. Impact of Internal Conflict on Women - A. Forms of violence against women in the conflict:

        Testimony given to the Special Rapporteur by A: “A group of armed men broke down the door of our home while we were sleeping; they knocked over the furniture and broke everything. They tied my father to a chair. They opened my legs and tied one leg to the wardrobe and the other to the bed. They insulted and threatened us. They raped my sister and me. Later we realized the same had happened to our neighbours and a young girl from the village was taken to hospital for her injuries.” (para 38)

        Testimony given to the Special Rapporteur by B: “500 paramilitaries arrived in our village because it is in guerrilla territory. They threatened us and took women to work for them. They killed girls, boys, men and women. We were not allowed to pick them up, the bodies were eaten by dogs. They hanged children and sexually mutilated bodies. Many women were raped. I faked a letter saying that I had to go to town as my aunt was very ill. The paramilitaries said I could only go if I left my daughter with them. I fled in the night with my three children. I live on the outskirts of Cartagena; the conditions are very bad as the area is flooded most of the time; I have to tie the children to the bed to prevent them from falling into the water at night.” (para 39)

        Testimony given to the Special Rapporteur by C: “The paramilitaries arrived in the town, they collected everyone together and put on some music and started to drink, they killed some chickens, raped some women, killed a few people and danced. Paramilitaries wore balaclavas. They forced women to cook for them. They only raped the young girls. Their party went on for four days. [...]" (para 40)

        Testimony given to the Special Rapporteur by D: “We have been living under extreme terror, there is only one way in and out of the barrio and it is controlled by the paramilitaries. People are dragged out of their homes and killed in front of their family and children. Shop owners have been killed for not paying the bribes. In the last two weeks, six women have been killed, some because of their alleged relationship with the guerrillas, others because they refuse to give sex. One girl was raped before she was killed; they took out her eyes, pulled out her nails and cut off her breasts. One boy had his penis cut off and put in his mouth. There is constant crossfire between the different armed groups, we can’t sleep. We are afraid to leave the house to go to work or to send the children to school. When the police arrive everything is calm and the paramilitaries mingle with the police as they walk around the barrio. We need peace; the Government must do something.” (para 41)

        Armed factions threaten and abuse women for being in solidarity with their husbands or partners, or because of the partner they have chosen, or for protecting their sons or daughters from forced recruitment. Furthermore, survivors describe how paramilitaries arrive in a village and completely control and terrorize the population; they reportedly commit human rights abuses with total impunity. (para 42)

        Sexual violence by armed groups against women, youths and girls has not been sufficiently highlighted: “Sexual violence against women, prostitution and sexual slavery have been justified in military occupied areas because of reasonable male needs or even encouraged and organized by high ranking members.” Women who are subjected to sexual violence by members of armed factions are forced to hide their tragedy for a number of reasons, predominantly because they fear the death threats they receive from those who rape them. Rape survivors are often left pregnant and have to look after the child of the rape. (para 43)

        In addition to the rape and abduction of women and girls carried out by all armed groups, the paramilitaries have begun practising other forms of control in the regions they dominate. They impose territorial limits on freedom of movement and impose curfews; if a curfew is broken women are raped and then killed. They impose strict codes of social conduct, including restrictions on what women may wear and penalties for “misbehaviour”. [...] Furthermore, pregnant women who have been forced to remain in cocaine-growing areas under paramilitary control and who have been exposed to fumigation of the illicit crops reportedly have miscarriages, foetal malformations, skin problems and respiratory infections as a result. (para 46)

        B. Female combatants:

        Testimony taken from a former combatant, known as E: E joined the guerrilla (FARC) at 13, tired of being ignored and mistreated by her father. She was looking for a way out, thinking things would change if she had a weapon. When she was 19, the guerrilla commander of her group took advantage of his position to take her away alone, far from the group, and there he raped her, beat her and then sent her home. He gave her the mission of seducing a member of the Colombian army in order to obtain information for the guerrilla. She did as she was told, but the guerrilla commander was not satisfied, because she had approached a low-ranking officer. The commander went to her house and complained violently. Her father intervened to stop him and the commander killed him and threatened her if she spoke. The day after her father’s burial she gave herself over to the Colombian army, thinking this was her only way out. She thought she might have to pay a penalty and then would be free - a civilian. But after a few days the army gave her a thought she might have to pay a penalty and then would be free - a civilian. But after a few days the army gave her a uniform and told her that the only solution was to work for them. E felt she had no alternative. (para 47)

        The army Colonel treated her cruelly and inhumanely: apart from her fulfilling the everyday tasks of any battalion member, he took E for his personal service (taking care of his clothes, cutting his toenails etc.). More than once, while he was drunk, he sent for her, but there was a member of the army who always protected her from being sexually abused by the Colonel. The Colonel told her that he could send her to jail or kill her if she failed to obey his orders. Each month the Colonel made her sign a payroll slip for the sum of approximately US$ 500, of which she received not a cent. At the same time she thought she had to obey in order to pay her penalty for having been in the guerrilla. (para 48)

        Later on, E was forced to participate in military actions, some of them against civilians. She stayed more than a year in this situation in the Colombian army until she managed to leave. Now she wants to go on with her life, but she does not feel safe, she lives in fear, she is terrified that the army Colonel will find her one day. She is very afraid for herself and her family. (para 49)

        The Special Rapporteur took testimonies from girls who had been recruited and used by the armed groups as sexual slaves, combatants, informers, guides and messengers. (para 50)

        Guerrilla groups are reported to have abducted young girls as companions for their leaders. Reports have also been received of girls being lured into the FARC and then abused. So-called “recruitment” is based on persuasion, as there is little other alternative. Self-defence groups/paramilitaries are also reported to have kidnapped girls and used them as sexual slaves; it is difficult to obtain formal complaints as those who have escaped live in constant fear of reprisals against themselves or their family. (para 51)

        For some girls, the male-oriented culture affects their attraction to uniforms, weapons and the power they represent. Girls often join an armed group thinking that, once they are a part it, they will be treated as equals and be given the same rights as men. They seek to overcome exclusion and disregard life in their own families, where they can only be associated with domestic roles. Several of the girls interviewed, who were former combatants, admitted to having been victims of family violence or abused by a relative. (para 52)

        When armed groups seek to increase their forces, children from rural areas and from economically deprived urban groups, become an easy recruitment catch. The armed groups make promises about giving the children an education and a chance for a brighter future. Establishing the difference between voluntary or forced recruitment is no easy task. In general, children are forced into enrolling by poverty, family violence, exclusion, family break-up, lack of opportunities and services, insufficient or low quality health care and education, or lack of adequate employment opportunities in accordance with ILO standards and Colombian legislation. Within this context, armed groups become the only economic alternative for them and their families. Other children join armed groups for political reasons or to avenge the deaths of family members. (para 53)

        There are no precise figures available concerning the numbers of children who are part of armed groups. Some sources estimate that a total of 6,000 children participate in the existing armed factions. (para 54)

        The testimonies provided by former combatants show how, while they were members of an armed group, they were subject to different types of violence because of their gender, such as sexual abuse and/or harassment by superiors. The Government has enacted new legislation criminalizing acts of sexual abuse against children, which is a welcome move to try and address the problem. However, it will require implementation and additional resources before any changes will be seen. (para 55)

        Forced birth control is another type of gender-related violence girls suffer within armed groups. According to the People’s Advocate Office, the majority of girls no longer belonging to guerrilla groups in Surata, Santander, were sexually active and some had an interuterine device (IUD). The girls reported that the guerrillas had provided them with contraceptives periodically. Moreover, approximately 70 per cent of these girls had sexually transmitted diseases. Forced abortion is also common in armed groups. If a woman wants to keep the child, she must escape. the Special Rapporteur heard that many women have died trying to escape and protect their unborn child, as camps can be 15 to 20 days walk from a settlement where they can seek assistance. (para 56)

        Two years ago, the Colombian Family Welfare Institute (ICBF) began a pilot project for children and youth former combatants who were captured, have voluntarily surrendered or whom the parties to the conflict have handed over to State agencies. The type of assistance provided under this project takes account of gender. The project has a legal and legislative framework that supports any action aimed at protecting essential rights of children and youths no longer taking part in the conflict. The project also provides them with personal and psychosocial assistance. (para 57)

        Estimating the number of former combatants is difficult as not all of them use the mechanisms offered by the authorities or report to these authorities. According to UNICEF estimates, 208 cases of child demobilization were registered between May 1996 and November 1998. (para 58)

        C. Female internally displaced persons:

        Of the 60,623 displaced persons registered in the Information System on Population Displaced through Violence in Colombia (RUT) by the National Social Pastoral Secretariat, 29,683 are women - 24,392 of them of mixed race - 4,666 Afro-Colombians and 635 indigenous; 51.59 per cent are children - 16,257 boys (52 per cent) and 15,015 girls (48 per cent). (para 66)

        There are, however, several problems with the figures: they are cumulative figures, hindering any possibility of estimating cases in which persons have been displaced more than once (displacement/return/displacement processes are frequent among displaced persons who arrive finally in large cities); there is no information available regarding those who return spontaneously or were relocated. And even if the information gathered is differentiated at the source, this information is not processed to show the different impact of displacement on men and women. Furthermore, women displaced alone or who are heads of households are under-registered because they fear informing the authorities. 68. The vast majority of the displaced population are women and children, and most are left to fend for themselves with little, if any support. Estimates concerning the proportion of displaced women in Colombia range somewhere between 49 per cent and 58 per cent of the total displaced population. Displaced women and children together account for 74 per cent of displaced Colombians who need special assistance. The figure can reach 80 per cent when the displaced population found in large urban areas is included. (para 68)

        A study made on the displaced population in Bogotá found that 40 per cent of the women who were heads of households were widows who had fled with their children after their husbands died violently, while 18 per cent had been abandoned after arriving in the city. Women who are separated by their displacement - either individually or with their family - are far more vulnerable than those who flee in the midst of a large and relatively organized group (such as in certain regions of the Middle Magdalena and Uraba). (para 70)

        Information on children and displacement is also scarce. According to the Information and Displacement Follow-Up System (SIDES), 13 per cent of displaced children in 1998 were under 5, 20 per cent were between 5 and 9, 13 per cent were between 10 and 14, and 9 per cent between 14 and 18 years of age. UNICEF believes that there are some 6,000 children, mostly aged between 14 and 18, in illegal armed groups. Many of them come from displaced communities. Several studies have shown that displacement is relatively common in parents who try to avoid illegal armed groups recruiting their son or daughter. (para 71)

        Most of those who suffer displacement, particularly indigenous and Afro-Colombians, are agriculture oriented and depend on land for their self-support and organization. With regard to the protection of territories belonging to ethnic groups for example, Paz del Atrato communities in Uraba and Cacarica (Choco) already have collective property rights. But in both cases, women’s rights to these lands have not been appropriately guaranteed. In the event of separation or abandonment, women and children will be left in an extremely precarious situation regarding land. (para 73)

        Women, especially women from rural areas cannot access personal documents or registration very easily. These women consequently face greater difficulties in obtaining land titles, loans, a home and health and education services. This problem is worse for indigenous women and those of African descent because of cultural barriers that deepen inequalities. Additionally, family abandonment and lack of paternal acknowledgement is a common problem for child registration and for the displaced child’s right to a name. (para 74)

        Return relocation or socio-economic reintegration projects in general fail to address women’s needs adequately. Adolescents are faced with a more serious situation, as they lack any training and employment programmes. Project impact is scarcely followed up or assessed, hindering access to differentiated, trustworthy data regarding the true scope of any initiative in favour of internally displaced persons. (para 76)

        Women, and in particular Afro-Colombian and indigenous women, have limited access to general health systems and the quality of services is worse for those from minority communities. Health concerns brought to the Special Rapporteur’s attention included reproductive health, malnutrition and mental health. Little is being done by the State to provide trauma counselling for women who have suffered from the impact of the conflict. On a limited basis, UNIFEM, UNFPA and UNHCR provide reproductive health care and psychosocial and economic support for women and girls. However, as women and girls are disproportionately affected and displaced by conflict the humanitarian assistance is inadequate to meet their specific needs. Reproductive health services are crucial to save lives and prevent illness. (para 80)

        The Special Rapporteur recalls that, in accordance with the Deng Principles on Internal Displacement, article 10 of Law 387 of 1997 states the need to provide special assistance to women and children, particularly to widows, women heads of households and orphans. Article 17 provides for the direct access of those displaced to government social offers and particularly to social and health assistance, education and rural and urban housing, and programmes for children, women and the elderly, in order to achieve socio-economic stability. (para 81)

        During her visit, the Special Rapporteur interviewed female IDPs, who spoke openly to her about their lives: the incredible losses, grief, uncertainty, fear, violence, discrimination faced in the host community, dreams for the future and hopes for their children. Going into one of the IDP squatter camps on the outskirts of Cartagena gave the Special Rapporteur an opportunity to see the reality of life there. Displaced communities live in particularly precarious conditions, on wasteland that is constantly flooded, without access to basic facilities such as water, electricity, sanitation and medical services. Children often have no access to regular schooling. (para 84)

        The difficult living conditions for IDPs in squatter camps on the fringes of the cities and the fact that most of the men face unemployment have led to an increase in intra-familiar violence in these communities. Women and children are the main victims of family violence. A survey published by PROFAMILIA37 in August 2001 on the situation of displaced women indicates that one out of every two women surveyed has suffered physical abuse from her spouse and 20 per cent of pregnant women were subjected to physical violence during their pregnancy. (para 85)

        The Special Rapporteur also heard reports that women and young girls from the IDP communities are vulnerable to being trafficked into forced prostitution in tourist centres in Colombia and abroad. (para 86)

        IV. Social Support for Victims of Gender-Based Violence:

        The general human rights situation in Colombia has deteriorated during the past year; there have been many attacks on human rights defenders. Women’s organizations, especially peasant, indigenous and Afro-Colombian women’s organizations, and their leaders, are subject to systematic intimidation and persecuted for the work that they do to defend and improve living conditions for their communities. Members are not the only ones directly affected. Women’s children, husbands or partners have also been murdered as a result of the woman’s social and political activities. (para 90)

        International bodies such as UNCHR, OHCHR, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and international cooperating agencies such as Project Counselling, Terre des Hommes, Save the Children and State agencies such as the Office of the People’s Advocate and the Gender Study Programme of the Colombian National University also participate in the Working Group on Women and Armed Conflict as observers. (para 95)

        V. Conclusions and Recommendations:

        The situation of displaced women and the situation of women and girls who are combatants and former combatants must be addressed as a matter of priority. (para 105)

        A. At the national level:

        All parties to the conflict must take measures to protect women and girls from rape and other forms of gender-based violence, including instructing all the warring factions to respect international humanitarian law. Rape, forced contraception and sterilization, forced prostitution, sexual slavery and other forms of gender-based violence are serious breaches of international humanitarian law. The Special Rapporteur urges the armed factions to state publicly that rape in the conduct of armed conflict constitutes a war crime and may constitute a crime against humanity under defined circumstances, and that anyone who commits rape will be brought to justice. (para 107)

        In this regard the Special Rapporteur supports the recommendations made by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that the State:

        (iv) Ratify the Statute of the International Criminal Court, the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict. (para 118)

        The Special Rapporteur urges all parties to the conflict to abide by and ensure the enforcement of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement. She reiterates the need to implement fully the recommendations made by the Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations on internally displaced persons to the Government of Colombia and armed groups of Colombia. These include special attention to the particular needs of women and children, who make up the majority of the displaced population. The State must adopt effective measures to guarantee that the particular security concerns of women and girls displaced by the conflict are met, including measures against rape and trafficking. (para 124)

        The Special Rapporteur calls for the development and implementation of programmes for the social reintegration of former female combatants. The support provided to girl former combatants should include evaluating past experiences. If these experiences are denied or treated as social maladjustment, or are managed with guilt and resentment, these girls are denied the possibility of understanding their experiences within a political and historical context and of coming to terms with them. (para 126)

        B. At the international level:

        All international organizations working in Colombia should protect and support the delivery of humanitarian assistance for women and girls affected by the conflict, in particular internally displaced women. Women’s human rights should be central in the planning of reconstruction and rehabilitation programmes. (para 129)

         

        Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, Param Cumarasamy

        (E/CN.4/1998/39/Add.2)

        Country visits: 15 to 27 September 1996
        Report published: 30 March 1998

        • Introduction:
        • Colombia has ratified, inter alia, the following international human rights instruments: [...] the Convention on the Rights of the Child [...]. (para 10)
        • In addition, given the situation of internal armed conflict that the State is faced with and the fact that the Government has ratified the relevant international humanitarian treaties, the Special Rapporteur also took into consideration international humanitarian standards concerning the right to due process and the right to have an independent and impartial court during a non-international conflict. (para 11)
        • The Special Rapporteur also took into consideration the following international instruments: [...] United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Administration of Juvenile Justice (“The Beijing Rules”) [...]. (para 12)

        Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, Mr Maurice Glèlè-Ahanhanzo

        (E/CN.4/1997/71/Add.1)

        Country visits: 28 June to 15 July 1996
        Report published: 13 January 1997

        II. Serious obstacles to be overcome - A. The weight of the past and economic and social disparities:

        According to studies by psychologists and testimony gathered, one consequence of racial discrimination and acculturation has been a severe loss of identity among Afro-Colombians who, according to the CIMARRON movement, include Afro-Indians, Afro-Mestizos and Afro-Creoles. The members of these communities have a low self-image. The children do not know how to present themselves; Mestizos lighten or straighten their hair since “black is ugly”. The children do not like their noses; they look down on themselves. Self-discrimination is also observed among Afro-Colombians. Unlike the indigenous inhabitants, Afro-Colombians do not have a collective awareness and solidarity; they are Afro-Colombians, but first they are from Chocó, Tumaco, Uraba, etc. (para 40)

        School enrolment rates :

        1. Primary : 60 per cent for Blacks as opposed to 70 per cent for Whites in urban areas; and 73 per cent for Blacks as opposed to 41 per cent for Whites in rural areas;

        2. Secondary : Afro-Colombians, 38 per cent as opposed to 88 per cent for Whites in urban areas;

        3. University : only 2 out of every 100 young Blacks in urban communities go to university; 80 per cent of Afro-Colombians cannot afford university studies. (para 41(b))

        Few Afro-Colombian students attend the National University in Bogotá, which has approximately 25,000 students. Afro-Colombians have to take an entrance examination, and there is no curriculum for them. Racist graffiti singling them out are frequently found on walls. A teacher of anthropology is said to have told one of his students: “Work like a Black so you can earn like a White.” There are some private universities, but Afro-Colombians cannot afford to pay the fees of $2,000 to $3,000. (para 42)

        There is no Afro-Colombian university. Quibdo University, in Chocó, which the Special Rapporteur visited and where he held a working meeting with the Vice-Rector and teaching staff, has 98 per cent Black students and teachers but is not considered to be an Afro-Colombian university since, as the teachers themselves admitted, for a long time they themselves were the vectors of the dominant, essentially European attitudes, affirming and celebrating the superiority of the White man, which aimed at making the Black man White! They had no conception of the development of the black population with all its cultural heritage. According to the people with whom the Special Rapporteur spoke, school, university and cultural life is dominated by racial and racist symbolism; for example, Blacks on television are always domestic servants; there is not a single Afro-Colombian journalist, except for one sports reporter, and women are used in advertisements for detergents. Recently, however, an advertisement appeared showing a white child and a black child side by side. (para 43)

        The weight of the past can also be seen in the disparity of economic and social statistics relating to the black and indigenous communities, on the one hand, and the rest of the Colombian population, on the other. Centuries of racial discrimination have led to marginalization, and large-scale action will be needed to wrest these communities from it. (para 47)

        The image of Amerindians in Colombian society still remains that of the “savage”, as indicated by Act No. 89 of 25 November 1890, entitled “ [Ley] por la cual se determina la manera como deben ser gobernados los salvajes que vayan reduciéndose a la vida civilizada ” (Act determining the way in which the savages who are being won over to civilization should be governed). (para 48)

        Socio-economic indicators for the indigenous populations show that 45 per cent cannot read, whereas the national average is estimated at 11 per cent. The percentage of indigenous children enrolled in primary school is 11.3, while the national enrolment rate is 85 per cent. Only 1.25 per cent of indigenous pupils reach secondary level (50 per cent nationwide). (para 49)

        In the field of health, infant mortality is estimated at 110 per thousand, or four times the national average. High rates of mortality and morbidity have been linked to malnutrition in the areas inhabited by indigenous populations. (para 50)

        E. Ubiquitous violence:

        The situation is particularly tragic in the Uraba region (Chocó and Antioquia departments), where violence is endemic on account of the clashes between the army, paramilitary groups and drug-traffickers. Many communities have been displaced. In June 1996, 165 families belonging to the Zenú indigenous community in the municipality of Necoclí (Antioquia department) in north-west Colombia had to flee from their territory on account of the war. (para 64)

        In the towns of Buenaventura and Tumaco, hired killers and members of the police carry out “cleaning-up” (limpieza) operations, murdering young Afro-Colombians whom they wrongly assume to be thieves. Graffiti encouraging people to kill Blacks have frequently appeared on the walls of Buenaventura: Hágale un favor a la pátria. Mate un negro y reclame un pavo - literally, “Do your country a good turn: kill a nigger and win a turkey”. Police officers have been blamed for these graffiti. (para 65)

        UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions

        Philip Alston

        A/HRC/14/24/Add.2

        Country visits: 8 to 18 June 2009
        Report published: 31 March 2010

        No mention of children's rights.

        UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders

        Margaret Sekaggya

        A/HRC/13/22/Add.3

        Country visits: 7 to 18 September 2009
        Report published: 4 March 2010

        No mention of children's rights.

        UN Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health

        A/HRC/7/11/Add.3

        Country visits: 20 to 22 September 2007
        Report published: 4 March 2008

        No mention of children's rights.

         

        Organisation: 
        Child Rights International Network

        Countries

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