Following another deadly attack on one of its members, the former guerrilla group on Sunday called on the international community to pressure President Ivan Duque to execute his country’s peace process.
In the letter, the FARC accused Duque of being complacent with the excessive violence that since 2016 has killed at least 130 demobilized FARC members, and social leaders and, according to official statistics, at least 460 human rights defenders in the country.
These facts are the result of the lack of guarantees and security on the part of the government of President Ivan Duque, despite the fact that the Peace Agreement includes measures and tools for that purpose… The current policy of the government continues to be to tear the Agreement to shreds.
FARC
Duque, whose far-right Democratic Center party is a fierce opponent to the peace process, is “complacent with the quota of blood claimed by the friends of war, the FARC wrote.
The FARC’s letter followed only days after a blistering letter from the United Nations human rights office in which it called on the Colombian government to “make a significant effort” to end the “endemic impunity” enjoyed by those behind the mass killing of the country’s social leaders and demobilized guerrillas.
Colombia suffering “endemic impunity” for mass killing of social leaders: UN
While the international community has been pressuring Duque to honor the 2016 peace deal with the former guerrillas and victims of the armed conflict, the FARC also called on the Colombian people to mobilize and defend peace.
We call upon the entire social movement, all political forces and the general public to speak out and continue to mobilize in defense of life and peace. Enough of the attacks against the lives of those of us who bet on peace.
FARC
Social organizations have requested the International Criminal Court to investigate the ongoing killing of social leaders in Colombia amid apparent state failures to do so.
