Accusations Continue against the Commission of Justice and Peace

Accusations and defamation operations against the Commission of Justice and Peace continue, which try to protect military members and businessmen and to prevent collective property restitution in Curvaradó and Jiguamiandó.

JUAN MANUEL SANTOS

President of the Republic of Colombia

GERMÁN VARGAS LLERAS

Minister of the Interior

MARÍA ANGELA HOLGUÍN

Minister of Foreign Relations

JUAN CAMILO RESTREPO

Minister of Agriculture

VIVIAN MORALES

Attorney General of the Nation

ALEJANDRO ORDOÑEZ

Inspector General of the Nation

VOLMAR PÉREZ

National Ombudsman

“So stand fast with your loins girded in truth, clothed with righteousness as a breastplate” Ephesians 6, 14

Re: Intimidations and accusations against members of the Commission of Justice and Peace

Our Historical Documentation and Ethical Censure of the continued intimidations and defamation operations against our Commission of Justice and Peace, operations which try to protect businessmen benefiting from paramilitary actions, to protect military members involved in crimes against humanity, to prevent the restitution of collective territory in Curvaradó and Jiguamiandó, and to impose business operations without consulting the inhabitants of Cacarica or of areas where paramilitary operations have occurred and internal armed conflict persists.

Our Documentation of the surveillance, intimidation and harassment of the human rights defenders of our Commission of Justice and Peace, in the social and familial spheres of life as in the case of Danilo Rueda.
Since 2003, through work orders within the DAS’s offensive operations of illegal persecution, a strategy of false judicial accusations, the paying of false witnesses, frame-ups, surveillance, and defamation campaigns have been carried out, protecting military members’ responsibility in crimes against humanity and paramilitarism, as well as the responsibility of business beneficiaries or business participants in the development of the paramilitary strategy. All that has been brought to light by the Afro-Colombian and indigenous communities associated with territory and life protection proposals such as Humanitarian and Biodiversity Zones, and associated with the work of our Commission of Justice and Peace.

The current events are in continuity with a strategy of criminal foundations refashioned into a mechanism of judicial, social and political impunity for the events in the Bajo Atrato region since 1996. In October of 2008, the strategy of defamation and false judicial accusations were brought to light, in which the protagonists were former minister Fernando Londoño Hoyos and General Rito Alejo del Río Rojas, imprisoned for the murder of Marino López during operation Genesis.

This strategy has involved the use of witnesses by General Rito Alejo del Río Rojas, who claim falsehoods. Among them are the so-called “negritos”, including Jaime Beitar and Adán Quinto, whose intentions have coincided with those of Germán Marmolejo and the lawyer María Fernanda Cabel, former director of international relations of the Attorney General’s Office, promoter of Uno América and director of Fundagan.

The following is our Historical Documentation of the following events that confirm the vulnerability and risk facing the inhabitants of the Bajo Atrato, the members of the lower community councils that inhabit the Humanitarian Zones and Biodiversity Zones and the members of our Commission of Justice and Peace.

Sunday, December 26, 2010 and Sunday, January 9, 2011 at 8pm on the Cable News channel of former presidential advisor José Obdulio Gaviria and the lawyer Jaime Restrepo, member of the Guerrilla Victims Association (VIDA) and Uno América, the program slandered leaders of the lower councils that inhabit the Humanitarian Zones of Curvaradó, Jiguamiandó and Cacarica, the Peace Community of San José Apartadó, the Commission of Justice and Peace and other communities and organizations that have a presence in the region, claiming that they plan crimes and collaborate with the FARC guerrilla.

In the program, they presented, without context, the deposition of a demobilized guerrilla named “Jaison”, who lives on the premises of Army Brigade Seventeen in Carepa, Antioquia. Jaison claimed, without consistency, that according to what he had heard, the Commission of Justice and Peace bought computers for the FARC guerrilla. He presented this claim without evidence, and without detailed circumstances of manner, time and place.

In the same declaration, which wasn’t presented in its entirety to viewers, he acknowledged that, as part of the FARC, he had participated in the kidnapping of five members of our Commission of Justice and Peace in 2005. Similarly, in the program they used false testimony of Jaime Beitar, a member of the Domingodó community, who stated that the FARC, with the support of our Commission of Justice and Peace, have stripped him of his land and all that he owned in Chintadó in the community council of this territory.

The false witness didn’t refer to the fact that our organization has never done accompaniment work in the area of Domingodó territory. Nor does he present evidence, testimony, or other facts concerning the bad-faith occupation of his properties by our Commission of Justice and Peace.

In the program they asserted that the planting of palm oil was turned into a “criminal offense” by “a few NGOs” and according to Restrepo: “The FARC declared palm growers to be military targets and NGOs declared them to be judicial targets.”

Finally, the program made an invitation to join a mobilization intended to save “these communities from the infamous yoke of NGOs that exploit, oppress, and enslave them and impede their liberty.”

Sunday, January 9 the former president, Álvaro Uribe Vélez, retweeted: “By God, if it had not been for @JoseObdulio, no one would have cared about the theme of the “peace communities. End terrorism.”

Monday, January 10 through his twitter, Uribe left questions about what he called “peace communities.” AlvaroUribeVel Álvaro Uribe Vélez: http://bit.ly/h03Mdw Jose Obdulio, Peace Communities?

Wednesday, February 9 at 11:30 am a man entered our headquarters in Bogotá saying that he wanted to know if we were a NGO. He stated that he lived two houses down and that he had a complaint involving the department of Putumayo. When he was asked for his identity, he said that he was a “military correspondent” and left.

Thursday, February 18 in Bogotá, at 7:30 am a man on a red Suzuki GS 500 motorcycle, with plates SHH94, prowled around the living quarters of the human rights defender Danilo Rueda four times, in the La Soledad neighborhood. According to the witnesses, the motorcyclist appeared to have figured out the apartment in which the member of our Commission of Justice and Peace lives.

At 8:00 am the same day, a man dressed in civilian clothes arrived by motorcycle at the Commission of Justice and Peace headquarters in Bogotá. He said he was Alexander Díaz, and presented himself as a member of the international relations group within the police. The alleged policeman, who showed an ID, asked for one of the members of our protection detail assigned to our Commission of Justice and Peace. Before he left our office, he announced that he would be back in the afternoon.

The request for verification of this man’s employment by the police force was made the same day to the national government. Thirteen days later, on Tuesday March 1st of 2011 at 4pm, the national government informed our Commission of Justice and Peace that the Metropolitan Police of Bogotá didn’t identify Alexander Díaz as belonging to their entity.

Thursday, February 17 at 8:00 am a message was written to ContagioRadio.com, saying: “we will continue watching the militants and guerrillas.”

Friday, February 18 a video was posted on YouTube as the last in a series of twelve, denouncing our Commission of Justice and Peace. The profile that made the post identifies as “aliceblackful.”

Some of these videos are titled: “Hipocrecia (sic) humanitaria Comisión Intereclesial Justicia y Paz” (Humanitarian Hypocrisy of Interchurch Commission of Justice and peace), “Interchch Comission of Justice an peace- The Murder of Manuel Moya” (Interchurch Commission of Justice and Peace- The Murder of Manuel Moya), “Comisión Intereclesial Justicia y Paz – Desenmascarada por las propias comunidades” (Interchurch Commission of Justice and Peace – Unmasked by the communities themselves), “Testimonio desplazado_ la verdad de la ONG Justicia y Paz y sus campos de Concentración” (Displaced testimony – the truth about the NGO Justice and Peace and its concentration camps).

In some of the videos it is stated that: “the principle problem in the area is the NGO Justice and Peace, who is linked with the FARC guerrilla” (…) “The truth cannot be concealed, the NGO Justice and Peace is not what it appears.”

In another, Jaime Beitar, through an Afro-descendent woman of Cacarica, says: “Justice and Peace used us to fish for their money. The Intercongregational Commission of Justice and Peace, headed by Danilo Rueda and Abilio Peña, were those who walked with us. They had us locked in the settlement, Esperanza de Dios, no one could enter or leave…”

Monday, February 28 at 7:30 pm a bus left Turbo for Bogotá to advance a protest “against the priest of Justice and Peace, who wants the lands of Cacarica,” a protester said and added that they were going to protest in our offices and those of the Constitutional Court.
According to witnesses, Adán Quinto Mosquera and Jaime Beitar organized the buses.

At about 8:00 pm our Commission of Justice and Peace was informed that two hours before, five completely full buses had left Chigorodó. Danilo Murillo and Germán Marmolejo organized the buses.

Recall that Marmolejo was fraudulently elected, with support of businesses, as the legal representative of the Curvaradó river basin.
One of the passengers who boarded the bus said ecstatically that they were on their way to Bogotá to denounce the Commission of Justice and Peace, the Marxist priests, for stealing land and orchestrating murders, and to denounce the Constitutional Court, the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights as accomplices in the crimes and hand-over of land to mestizos.

Tuesday, March 1 in the afternoon Caracol Radio reported that a protest was carried out in front of the main entrance to the Constitutional Court because Afro-Colombian communities’ lands were to be given to mestizo communities. http://www.caracol.com.co/nota.aspx…

Wednesday, March 2 at 11:30 am close to 200 protestors made some of their accusations and demands known, stationed at the Constitutional Court building. Amongst the protesters was Darío Blandón.

He said that with the Court Order of May 18, the Constitutional Court revealed its racist stance. He also said that our Commission of Justice and Peace is responsible for assassinations, tortures, forced displacements and inducing fear and terror in the Bajo Atrato region as part of a relationship with the FARC-EP.

The Afro-descendent expressed in the name of the protesters the rejection of the presence of the Ombudsman, who they charge with having pacts with illegal groups. They state that seventeen million dollars have passed through Bajo Atrato, money that was captured by the NGO, while the Afro-Colombians continue living in poverty.

He said that they have received support from Jose Obdulio Gaviria, as presidential advisor, and from former minister Fabio Valencia. He announced that they are partaking in peaceful protests but that they will take up arms if they have to. And he demanded the expulsion of the Commission of Justice and Peace from Jiguamiandó, Curvaradó and Cacarica.

In addition to Blandón, the Afro-Colombian Danilo Murillo was recognized. He has worked for the palm businessman Gabriel Jaime Sierra Moreno, and also recently has spoken in favor of Sierra Moreno in order to avoid conviction. Murillo is looking for witnesses that favor this businessman.

Also participating in the protest were some Afro-Colombians, who less than a year and a half ago, began expressing false accusations against leaders of the lower and upper councils of the Bajo Atrato, inhabitants of the Humanitarian Zones, the José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers Collective, Colombian Commission of Jurists, CINEP and our Commission of Justice and Peace.

Wednesday, March 2 around 4:00 pm a dark green Toyota Fortuner S.U.V., with plates DBV 035, was observed driving by on three occasions. The occupants of the vehicle stopped and watched the office of our Justice and Peace Commission. This vehicle was in similar fashion at our offices on Monday, February 28th and Tuesday, March 1st.

Thursday, March 3 between 7:25 and 7:40 am, according to neighbors of the living quarters of Danilo Rueda a member of our Commission of Justice and Peace, a black motorcycle with two men stopped in front of the entrance of his apartment. One of the men got down and stood in front of the main doorway of the building, seeking to make out the floor on which the human rights defender lives. When the men observed the arrival of the protection detail adopted through precautionary measures, they left the site.

According to observers, the man who got off the bike was dressed in a black rain jacket with a hidden weight in his jacket. His companion had on a blue rain jacket.

Thursday, March 3 at 5:00pm in Medellín we learned of a letter against the Commission of Justice and Peace and father Alberto Franco CSsR, who they call a “Marxist priest.” The letter, which is signed by Afro-descendents, says they represent the interests of the Afro-Colombians and want to drive progress by means of the palm, cattle and banana businesses.

Again, our Historical Documentation and Ethical Censure of the plans of the businessmen that benefit from paramilitary actions, who, with a strategy of intimidation, defamation, false judicial accusations, the occupation of collective properties and the implementation of agribusiness, look to secure impunity and the continuity of their operations and business profits.

All of their actions seek to impede the restitution of the collective property to the inhabitants of the lower community councils, delegitimizing the lawful actions of the Constitutional Court.

They seek to cover-up the fraudulent use of public resources by para-business, which accompanied the implementation of palm agribusiness in Curvaradó and Jiguamiandó. They try to deny the development of the para-business strategy rendered by Raúl Hazbún, from which palm, cattle and banana businesses have benefited.

Our documentation of the absence of journalistic rigor, the lack of contrasted and checked sources, the decontextualized construction of depositions, all contrary to ethical codes, in order to give credibility to a lie and make the lie appear as the truth. An examination with due process, with sound judgment and unbiased and exhaustive journalistic interpretation, shows that the given evidence is not evidence at all.

Our Ethical Censure of the continuity of the eight years of operations of persecution against the members of our Commission of Justice and Peace. These operations have not been efficiently or quickly investigated, which continues to protect the authors of crimes against humanity and businessmen who have benefitted from paramilitarism as well as those who have directly participated in the paramilitary strategy.

Our Ethical Censure of the continuation of intimidating and threatening covert operations against the Commission of Justice and Peace, as shown is being carried out against Father Alberto Franco and Danilo Rueda.

Given the collection of evidence that you know about, the international and constitutional responsibility that is derived from the fact that you know about criminal acts, such as the use of the judicial system as a means of persecution and the media as the setting and foundation of lies and falsehood, this knowledge obligates you to act to prevent irreparable damages to life and personal integrity. We hope that you at once adopt effective preventative and protective measures to enable the exercise of the legitimate defense of human rights.
With profound concern,

Interchurch Commission of Justice and Peace