COLOMBIA:
Torture as a ‘Side
Effect’ of Forced
Disappearance, Killings
By Constanza Vieira
BOGOTA (IPS) - The body
of trade unionist
Guillermo Rivera, who
was missing since April,
was finally found after
84 days of desperate
searching by his family
and friends.
The forensic experts
reported that the body
showed "clear signs of
torture," Jorge Gómez,
the widow's lawyer, told
IPS.
The 52-year-old Rivera
was last seen when he
took his daughter to her
bus stop on the morning
of Apr. 22. A witness
said she saw him arguing
with the police as they
handcuffed him and
shoved him into a police
car. "Why are you taking
me?" she heard him ask
the officers.
Security cameras located
near Rivera’s home on
the south side of Bogotá
"showed that several
police cars were present
at the time and place
where the gentleman
disappeared," a source
at the Attorney
General’s Office told
IPS.
IPS was able to confirm
that there were four
police cars and several
motorcycles.
The day after he went
missing, Rivera's wife,
Sonia Betancur, received
a call from the
cell-phone of her
husband, who worked for
the city government, was
the president of a
Bogotá trade union and
was a member of the
Communist Party.
"The phone call was very
confusing, she didn't
understand a thing,"
said Gómez.
A week later, the
Attorney General’s
Office reported that the
call had been made from
San Martín, 159 km south
of Bogotá, a town that
is a centre of
operations of the
far-right paramilitaries
in the province of Meta.
The National Commission
for the Search for
Disappeared Persons,
created by law in 2006,
finally located Rivera’s
body.
His corpse had
originally been found on
Apr. 24 in a dump along
a road near the city of
Ibagué, 215 km east of
the capital, and was
buried in an
unidentified grave in
that city on Apr. 28.
When it was exhumed by
the Commission, forensic
exams and fingerprinting
showed that the body
belonged to Rivera, who
was given a funeral on
Jul. 17 in Bogotá,
amidst protest
demonstrations over his
death.
"The search was marked
by negligence and
ineffectiveness on the
part of the Attorney
General’s Office," but
in addition, "it can
almost be said that
there was complicity of
all kinds by several
state institutions in
this disappearance,"
said Gómez, who served
as ombudsman in the
conflict-ridden region
of Magdalena Medio
between 2002 and 2006,
"where 100 percent of
forced disappearances
have gone uninvestigated
and unpunished."
"There is a series of
elements that make it
possible to say that he
was ‘disappeared’ by the
police," added another
source, who clarified
however that it was not
the Metropolitan Police
but "another state
structure."
Rivera was the 28th
trade unionist killed
this year in Colombia,
which has become the
most dangerous country
in the world for labour
activists.
Another serious aspect
of the case is that
Rivera was tortured
before he was killed.
Victims of murder or
arbitrary detention are
frequently tortured,
according to the 2007
report on Torture and
Cruel, Inhumane or
Degrading Treatment in
Colombia, presented last
week in Bogotá by the
Colombian Coalition
Against Torture.
But torture in such
cases is rarely
mentioned, and is
relegated to the
category of a mere side
effect, said lawyer
Jahel Quiroga, director
of Reiniciar, a group
that forms part of the
Coalition. "You often
hear it said about a
victim that ‘they killed
him,’ but not that he
was previously
tortured," she added.
In fact it took IPS more
than 24 hours to confirm
that the forensic report
on Rivera’s death showed
that he had been
tortured. The sources
consulted invariably
first mentioned his
alleged arbitrary
detention and
extrajudicial execution.
The Coalition is also
made up of the
Association of Relatives
of the
Detained-Disappeared (ASFADDES),
and five other local
human rights groups, as
well as the World
Organisation Against
Torture (OMCT) and the
Italian chapter of Terre
des Hommes.
Another member
organisation, the
Colombian Commission of
Jurists, documented 346
cases of torture, in
which 234 of the victims
died, from July 2004 to
June 2007. Last year
alone, 93 cases were
reported, in which 43 of
the victims were killed.
Of the total number of
torture victims
documented by the human
rights group, 18 were
women and 11 were
children.
The report blames 90
percent of the cases on
the state - 70.4 percent
for "direct
perpetration" by state
agents and 19.7 percent
as a result of tolerance
of, or support for,
human rights abuses
carried out by
paramilitary groups.
Leftwing guerrilla
groups were held
responsible for 9.8
percent of the cases,
the report adds.
The Coalition states
that torture in Colombia
is systematic,
widespread and
deliberate, and is used
as a means of political
persecution with the
goal of sowing terror
among individuals,
communities and social
movements.
The victims are
frequently peasant
farmers living in war
zones, where state
security forces are
stronger than civilian
authorities and
officials. Other
frequent victims are
human rights defenders,
social activists and
trade unionists like
Rivera.
An undetermined number
of torture cases in
rural areas end in
extrajudicial executions
that are later reported
as "deaths in combat",
says the Coalition,
which provides the
figure of 955 victims
presumably killed by the
security forces in the
five years up to June
2007 (including 236
murdered from July 2006
to June 2007 alone).
Torture is also often
associated with forced
disappearance. ASFADDES
says signs of appalling
torture have been found
on the majority of human
remains found in common
graves and clandestine
cemeteries, whose
location has been
revealed by members of
paramilitary militias
who have taken part in a
demobilisation process
negotiated with the
government, in order to
gain legal benefits and
lenient sentences.
The Coalition also
mentions 235 forced
disappearances "directly
attributable to the
public forces" in the
five years up to June
2007.
"Torture is a war crime.
It is, precisely, one of
the crimes contemplated
in the system
established by the
International Criminal
Court (ICC)," OMCT
director Eric Sottas
told IPS.
"It is clear that at
some point, the ICC
could exercise its
jurisdiction over this"
in Colombia, he added.
This civil war-torn
country ratified the
Rome Statute, which
created the ICC, in
August 2002.
The Coalition reports
that no perpetrators
have been identified or
punished in nearly 90
percent of torture
cases, principally
because of the state’s
refusal to acknowledge
the persistence of this
phenomenon.
Article 8 of the Rome
Statute states that "The
Court shall have
jurisdiction in respect
of war crimes in
particular when
committed as a part of a
plan or policy or as
part of a large-scale
commission of such
crimes."
That makes particularly
significant the
Coalition report’s
conclusion that "torture
in Colombia is a
systematic and
generalised practice."
The Coalition recommends
that the rightwing
government of Álvaro
Uribe ratify the
Facultative Protocol to
the U.N. Convention
Against Torture, which
provides for the
possibility of
truth-finding visits to
signatory countries.
It also urges the
government to require
demobilised paramilitary
fighters to provide full
confessions of their
crimes, including
torture, in order to be
eligible for legal
benefits.
In addition, it calls on
the state to adopt a
specific public policy
aimed at preventing
torture and putting an
end to the impunity that
surrounds such cases.
|
|
|
|
|
|
