{"id":27641,"date":"2019-01-01T11:22:35","date_gmt":"2019-01-01T11:22:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=27641"},"modified":"2019-01-01T11:22:35","modified_gmt":"2019-01-01T11:22:35","slug":"un-85-farc-members-killed-in-colombia-since-peace-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=27641","title":{"rendered":"UN: 85 FARC members killed in Colombia since peace deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

In the two years since Colombia<\/a> signed a peace deal<\/a> with the left-wing FARC<\/a> rebels, 85 members of the armed-group-turned-political-party have been killed, the United Nations<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

Colombia’s\u00a0special investigation unit, quoted in a new UN report published on Monday, blamed “illegal armed groups and criminal organisations” for the killings.<\/span><\/p>\n

In his quarterly report on the UN’s mission to Colombia, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres<\/a> urged Colombia’s President Ivan Duque<\/a> – a vocal critic of the peace accord, signed by his predecessor Juan Manuel Santos<\/a> – to better protect ex-combatants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The FARC, formerly known as The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, now operates as a political party under the name, Revolutionary Alternative Common Force.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It has hit out repeatedly at the lack of security guarantees for its members, many of whom are struggling to reintegrate into society despite being offered amnesty in the peace deal.<\/span><\/p>\n

Guterres said 14 ex-members of the FARC had been killed between September 26 and December 26 alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Most of the cases have been linked to the Gulf Clan drug-trafficking group that emerged out of disarmed right-wing paramilitaries in 2006, as well as FARC dissidents, the remnants of the now-disbanded EPL Marxist rebels and members of the still-active ELN<\/a>\u00a0armed group.<\/p>\n

Colombia has been wracked by more than half a century of armed conflict between rebel fighters, drug-traffickers, paramilitaries and state forces, which has left some eight million people dead, disappeared or displaced.<\/p>\n

Activists under pressure<\/h2>\n

Guterres said he was also “hugely” concerned by the number of murders of social leaders<\/a> and human rights defenders in Colombia, saying the UN had verified 163 of 454 reported cases since the peace accord was signed.<\/p>\n

“Most of the murders were in zones abandoned by former FARC [fighters] and where there is limited state presence,” the report said.<\/p>\n

Colombia’s human rights ombudsman estimates that 423 activists were murdered between 2016 and the end of November last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since the peal deal, illegal armed groups have filled the vacuum left by the FARC in isolated regions of the country.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite the ongoing violence, Colombia has seen a 40 percent decline in its murder rate since the deal was signed, according to the UN, with some 7,000 former FARC fighters laying down their weapons.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Colombia’s peace and reconciliation commission estimates that some 1,600 dissident rebels remain active. Some FARC members refused the peace deal and continue their fight against the government and drug-trafficking activities, while other groups, including most prominently the ELN, have botched several attempts<\/a> to reach a deal with the government.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\n SOURCE:
\n Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the two years since Colombia signed a peace deal with the left-wing FARC rebels, 85 members of the armed-group-turned-political-party have been killed, the United Nations said. Colombia’s\u00a0special investigation unit, quoted in a new UN report published on Monday, blamed “illegal armed groups and criminal organisations” for the killings. In his quarterly report on the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":27642,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}