Colombia’s Prosecutor General’s Office announced that the murder of a former senator in the early 1990s was a “crime against humanity,” local media reported on Friday.
The 1994 assassination of Senator Manuel Cepeda by agents of the Colombian state was officially declared a “crime against humanity,” according to W Radio.
The son of the fallen leader of the leftist Patriotic Union Party, Senator Ivan Cepeda Castro, praised the Prosecutor General’s Office for their decision on the matter.
According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, the murder of Senator Cepeda was the responsibility of Jose Miguel Narvaez, former deputy director of Colombia’s now-defunct intelligence agency, DAS.
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“I hope that this decision will help pave the way for justice in this case, and that very soon action will also be taken against the ex-sub-director of the DAS, Miguel Narvaez, who is being processed as the mastermind of this crime,” said the son of the murdered politician.
In August 2011, the Colombian government officially recognized its role in the death of Cepeda and issued a formal apology to late senator’s family, which was accepted by Ivan Cepeda.
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As for the man responsible for Cepeda’s murder, Narvaez is already standing trial for the 1999 murder of one of Colombia’s best-known public figures, journalist and television personality, Jaime Garzon.
