The consumption of drugs should be made illegal to break the increasingly close links with production, trafficking and organized crime, Colombia’s President told the General Assembly today as he warned about the dangers posed by the illicit drug industry.
Killings, torture, threats and arbitrary arrests of human rights defenders reportedly by both guerrillas and law officers persist in Colombia, despite the Government’s recent efforts to improve their lot, a United Nations expert said today.
Colombia witnessed a dramatic fall in coca cultivation and cocaine production in 2008, thanks in large part to the destruction of over 200,000 hectares of fields growing the illicit drug, according to a United Nations report released today.
An independent United Nations human rights expert today warned that although guerrilla groups in Colombia commit a significant number of murders, more concerning are the so-called ‘false positive’ slayings performed by security forces.
Over half a million Colombians in some of the nation’s remotest conflict zones have been able to obtain identification papers over the past five years thanks to mobile registration units supported by the United Nations refugee agency.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Colombia today expressed its deep concern over a spate of death threats made against human rights workers, including uprooted people defending their communities’ rights.
Heavy fighting in south-western Colombia between Government troops and the rebel Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) uprooted some 600 people at the weekend, the United Nations humanitarian arm reported today.
Some 50,000 Colombians who have fled insecurity in their homeland and have settled in northern Ecuador will be able to register themselves under a new programme being carried out by the Government with the help of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
The United Nations refugee agency today voiced concern over the ongoing displacement of indigenous communities in Colombia and called for investigations into credible reports of abuses.
Although progress has been made in addressing the humanitarian suffering in Colombia, particularly high levels of displacement due to conflict and natural disasters, the top United Nations relief official said that more needs to be done.
