Twelve Awa Indians were massacred in rural southwest Colombia last week. Seven children were among the dead including one infant. They were apparently shot by masked men wearing camoflauge. One suspect is in custody. He is alleged to have extorted the victims. However independent news organizations report that the government played a role in the killings. One of the victims, Tuilia Garcia, has recently been outspoken about the role the Colombian Government played in the death of her husband. She believed he was murdered by the Colombian Army and received threats for speaking out until the time of the massacre. She may not have been alone:
The massacre last week was the third mass killing of Awa Indians this year and the fourth since September of 2008. More than fifty Awa have been murdered in mass attacks since last September. The Marxist rebel group FARC is responsible for at least two of those mass killings.
Atrocities tantamount to war crimes have been committed on both sides of Colombia’s ugly and overlooked civil war, often with impunity. Even current President Alvaro Uribe has been implicated in giving tangible support to right-wing death squads. Over 11,000 child soldiers are forced to fight in the Colombian conflict, a number which is behind only Burma and the D.R.C. Colombia is second behind Sudan in its number of internally displaced persons with 3.1-4.5 million. As many as 380,000 were forced out of their homes last year alone.
Right-wing paramilitaries were known to invade villages where suspected FARC sympathizers resided, and hold the village hostage while they meted out brutal justice including punishments such as torture, quartering and beheading.
On February 18, 2000, some 300 armed men belonging to the ACCU set up a kangaroo court in the village of El Salado, Bolívar. For the next two days, they tortured, garroted, stabbed, decapitated, and shot residents. Witnesses told investigators that they tied one six- year-old girl to a pole and suffocated her with a plastic bag. One woman was reportedly gang-raped. Authorities later confirmed thirty-six dead. Thirty other villagers were missing. “To them, it was like a big party,” a survivor told the New York Times. “They drank, and danced, and cheered, as they butchered us like hogs.”
Though paramilitaries were largely disbanded in the mid 2000’s, perpetrators of these crimes have by and large escaped justice. FARC rebels also continue to commit terrorist attacks and take and hold hostages.
ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo visited Colombia a year ago to assess the Colombian government’s response to prosecuting war crimes. Ocampo has contended that FARC commanders could be tried for Crimes Against Humanity and has also expressed concerns about the right-wing paramilitaries being adequately prosecuted within the Colombian justice system considering current and former members of government are implicated in their crimes.
The Awa are not expecting swift justice. In fact, they are still waiting for a government panel to be commissioned by President Uribe before they even bury their dead. They are blockading the major roads into the small town of Ricuarte, the site of the massacre, until the government recognizes the gravity of the situation.
