Colombia needs to end impunity when the rights of women and the LGBTIQ+ population are violated

Marcela Sánchez, director of Colombia Diversa, believes that the South American country has the opportunity to become a laboratory for women’s equality, as she recently commented in a speech before the Security Council.

This opportunity comes from the inclusion of the gender issue as one of the axes of the peace agreement signed by the national government and the former guerrilla of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), in 2016.

In conversation with UN News, Sánchez, whose NGO is one of the most representative organizations in the fight for women’s equality and diversity in the South American country, however, specifies that, so that the incorporation of the gender perspective can be To be taken as a global model, it is necessary for the country to expedite the approval of laws that prevent impunity for the violation of the rights of women and the LGBTIQ+ population.

In addition, Sánchez observes the need to follow up on strategies that protect life and integrity.

“It is important that the Verification Mission has access to indicators that allow it to measure, for example, impacts due to non-compliance with the ceasefire by illegal armed groups against the LGBTIQ+ population, persecution for gender reasons, or cases of sexual violence; that can measure whether the gender perspective is being incorporated as it was in the 2016 agreements,” he explains.

For Sanchez, this includes that “The international community continues to set its eyes on Colombia”.

In his opinion, the achievements that are consolidated in this sense would set a precedent to protect the rights of these populations in Colombia and other parts of the world.

Advances and challenges on the gender issue

In its latest report on the United Nations Verification Mission in Colombia, the General secretary highlighted the progress that the country has made in implementing gender equality policies.

One of the most significant is the formulation of the National Action Plan with which Colombia seeks to effectively incorporate, at the national and territorial level, the Women, Peace and Security Agenda, with the participation of women, for the full guarantee of Your rights.

The plan is Colombia’s response to the Security Council’s recognition in 2000 of the unequal and disproportionate treatment of women and girls in armed conflicts.

“It is very positive that there is finally a National Action Plan (…) as with the total peace initiative [que promueve el actual Gobierno]and to continue sending an example to the world of the importance of inclusion, of these provisions being part of peacebuilding,” Carlos Ruiz Massieu, head of the Verification Mission, recently expressed.

In Colombia, the design of the Action Plan was developed with the participation of more than 1,500 women of multiple diversities, who made contributions to recognize the gender, intersectional, ethnic and anti-racist rights approach.

“This has been a historical process that recognizes the struggle of the Women’s Social Movements in the country, gives them voice and representation in the construction of peace and collects their ideas, visions and contributions to mainstream the gender approach in all actions that contribute to total peace,” explained the Foreign Ministry. from Colombia.

According to the Colombian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with the design of the National Action Plan, Colombia became the tenth country in the region to draw up a road plan to fulfill this mandate that has been adopted by 107 nations around the world.

Ruiz Massieu considers that it is necessary to complement this progress with the measures contemplated in the peace agreements with the FARC.

“Colombia was and is an example in terms of raising the standard of gender provisions in agreements, but we are still far from implementing the provisions. Progress has been made in some, but efforts must be redoubled,” he says.

For her part, Sánchez, the defender of the rights of lesbians, gays, bisexuals and trans people, adds that “Colombia, just as it was the example in including these provisions in the agreements, has the opportunity to be so with their implementation.”

UN Verification Mission

The gender approach in peace agreements

The dialogue table between the Colombian Government and the FARC recognized that the consequences of violations of International Humanitarian Law and violations of Human Rights are more serious when they are committed against women and girls or against the LGBTIQ+ population.

The peace agreement agreed in 2016 then included a series of actions to ensure a gender focus in each of its points, while UN Women prepared a publication that includes 100 measures that incorporate the gender perspective in the Peace Agreement between the national government and the FARC to end the conflict and build a stable and lasting peace.

Violence against the LGBTIQ+ population continues

According to the registry of the Victims Unit, of the 9.7 million victims of the armed conflict registered in Colombia, 6,200 correspond to the LGBTIQ+ population. In 2023, eight rights defenders from this community were murdered in different circumstances.

One of the recent cases was that of Aldinebin Ramos, co-founder of the LGBTIQ+ Chaparral Diversa Association, murdered in his home on February 6, 2024.

Colombia Diversa reported that Aldinebin is the third person from the group representing that organization to die after presenting his case before the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), a mechanism created by the peace agreement between the Colombian Government and the FARC to administer transitional justice for crimes of the armed conflict, committed before December 1, 2016.

“He presented his case to the Jurisdiction in 2019 and since then he has been waiting to participate, be recognized and compensated for the persecution he suffered due to his sexual orientation. “He died waiting for accreditation in macrocase 11,” indicated Colombia Diversa.

In this macro case, gender-based violence, sexual violence, reproductive violence, and other crimes committed due to prejudice based on sexual orientation, expression and/or diverse gender identity are investigated within the framework of the Colombian armed conflict.

“It is necessary to remember once again that LGBTIQ+ lives matter in a society that aims to be truly democratic. That is why it is essential that the authorities carry out an investigation into the events and guarantee security conditions for LGBTIQ+ people who assume leadership roles in the region. The Colombian State is indebted to incorporating differential approaches based on gender identity and sexual orientation in measures aimed at preventing, protecting and guaranteeing the work of human rights defenders,” Colombia Diversa emphasized in a public statement.

Marcela Sánchez insists that “The problem is that these crimes continue to be seen as a minor issue., but what we have to look at is the context in which these homicides occur, which is a discriminated population. “Every murder that goes uninvestigated sends the message that their lives are expendable.”

UN Verification Mission

Research

The Special Jurisdiction for Peace has detailed that in the so-called macrocase 11 “it places a special focus on the discriminatory elements of this violence and on the dynamics of war that reflect and multiply discriminations structural structures that have historically affected women, girls and people with diverse sexual orientations, identities and gender expressions.”

The mechanism has a record of 35,178 victims of all actors in the conflict, due to acts of sexual, reproductive and other gender violence and prejudice, in events that occurred between 1957 and 2016. Of them, 89.2% are women and 35 percent suffered violence when they were children and adolescents.

“In macro case 11 we continue to hope that the first victims can be accredited almost six months after it began. There is no failed case that speaks of an armed group victimizing so many LGBTIQ+ people. The JEP has the opportunity to do so,” says Marcela Sánchez.

“It is a new issue to understand that, that discrimination is serious. We already know that LGBTIQ+ people were displaced, murdered, tortured, subjected to forced labor and sexual violence was committed against them. But what was the glue that united them? The discrimination”, he concludes.

The period outlined for the implementation of the peace agreement sealed between the Government of Colombia and the former FARC guerrilla, by the then President of the Republic, Juan Manuel Santos, and the last commander of that illegal armed group, Rodrigo Londoño, alias Timochenko, he is 15 years old. Seven of them have already passed with the accompaniment of the United Nations Verification Mission.

This report was produced by Greace Vanegas for UN News.