Colombia

Roughly a third of the fighters in Colombia's former FARC rebel army have taken up arms again following a 2016 peace accord, posing a growing security risk in the Andean nation, according to a confidential military intelligence report reviewed by Reuters. The internal report puts the number of combatants belonging to dissident Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) groups at around 2,300, a sharp increase from about 300 at the time of the controversial peace agreement.

[…] In an extraordinarily harsh statement, UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executions Agnes Callamard urged the government to “stop inciting violence against the demobilized FARC” and “implement the peace accords” agreed with the former guerrillas in 2016.

Against a backdrop of challenges in implementing the peace process in Colombia, six independent UN human rights experts condemned on Tuesday the killing of a former member of the FARC-EP guerilla movement, which they said constitutes a “violation” of the guarantees made by the Government in the 2016 peace agreement.

A Colombian high court on Wednesday called on President Ivan Duque to sanction a law that implements peace agreement with demobilized FARC rebels, after upholding a Senate vote that rejected his proposed changes.

FARC president Rodrigo Londoño begged the more than 12,000 former guerrillas who disarmed in 2016 as part of a peace deal not to abandon the process after the recapture of former guerrilla leader “Jesus Santrich.” The FARC leader, who is also known as “Timochenko,” made the urgent call after an emergency meeting with former guerrillas chiefs and United Nations peace observers.

The political party formed by Colombia's former Marxist FARC rebels on Wednesday accused the far right of assassinating its members, but pledged to continue the process of reintegration.

Alarmed by the “strikingly high number” of human rights defenders being killed, harassed and threatened in Colombia, the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) in the country on Friday, called on authorities to “make a significant effort” to “tackle the endemic impunity” surrounding these cases.

The United Nations urged Colombia on Tuesday to take immediate action against ongoing violence in the northwest of the country. According to figures of the UN’s refugee agency UNHCR, over 1600 members of five different indigenous communities have been displaced as a result of armed conflict between illegal armed groups over the past two weeks in Jurado, a municipality in Choco.

The implementation of Colombia’s peace process made progress since it began in late 2016, but has so far failed to positively affect the lives of citizens, according to an extensive study. According to the Kroc Institute, which has monitored the progress of implementation of the 578 agreements made in the peace deal, 400 of these agreements are being implemented.