PBI in Colombia

According to Human Rights Watch, Colombia presents the most serious human rights and humanitarian situation in the region. Caught in the crossfire of an internal armed conflict involving government forces, guerrilla groups, and paramilitaries, the country has one of the largest populations of internally displaced people in the world.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights recently published a report on the situation of human rights defenders in the Americas and condemned the frequent incidents of threats, harassment and smear campaigns.

UN Special Representative on Human Rights Defenders, Hina Jilani, is particularly concerned that the situation for human rights defenders in Colombia continues to be precarious.

Human rights violations and infractions of international humanitarian law in Colombia are committed by armed actors from all sides and include massacres, killings, forced disappearances, kidnappings, torture and extortion.  According to the repeated denunciations of national and international institutions, members of the armed forces have also been implicated, both independently and in collaboration with paramilitaries. Impunity for such crimes, particularly when they involve high-ranking military officers, remains a serious problem.

PBI currently has 32 volunteers in Colombia in four sub-teams providing protection for NGOs, individuals and communities in Barrancabermeja and the Magadalena Medio, Bogotá, Urabá, and Medellín. The teams operate as observers in their areas, accompanying people or organisations under threat, making regular visits to conflict zones, distributing information about the evolution of the conflict, carrying out advocacy, lobbying and public relations work with representatives of the international community as well as civil and military authorities, and campaigning for international support.