Peace with the ELN and drug regulation, the recommendations of the Truth Commission (2/2)

This Tuesday, at the presentation ceremony of the Final Report of the Commissionthe president of the entity, the Jesuit priest Francisco De Roux, along with nine of the 11 commissioners who have led this arduous task, released Chapter 10 of the Report, where in addition to synthesizing the bulk of the findings made by the entity, The recommendations that are made to the Government for the effective overcoming of the conflict are also reflected.

>>> We invite you to read: Military romp and commitment to peace, the recommendations of the Truth Commission (1/2)

France 24 highlights five key points of the recommendations of the Truth Commission to the Colombian State. Second delivery:

• Peace talks with the ELN guerrilla

Among the recommendations that the Final Report of the Commission presented this June 28 is resume talks with the guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN)Y “advance in the formulation and implementation of a policy of submission to justice, both individual and collective, that offers reasonable incentives, that puts the victims at the center and guarantees the right to truth”.

During the government of the conservative Iván Duque, any hint of dialogue with this illegal armed group was dynamited at the beginning of 2019, when the illegal structure was allegedly the author of an attack with explosives on the General Santander Police School, which resulted in 21 dead and 68 wounded in Bogotá.

Gustavo Petro already announced during the electoral campaign that he wants to distance himself from his predecessor’s strategy and that he contemplates dialogues and a subjugation strategy for the ELN. In this way, he would be willing to endorse the Commission’s recommendation, which also urges him to “facilitate the creation of the necessary conditions and incentives for the negotiation, taking into account the lessons learned in past attempts.”

On the other hand, the Final Report suggests the ELN to adopt measures and make gestures that move in the direction of generating trust, respect for humanitarian organizations and International Humanitarian Law, as well as de-escalation of the conflict.

For the rest of the illegal armed structures, the Commission advocates a peaceful dismantling through a strategy of individual and collective submission that offers guarantees of Justice and reintegration to the members of these groups.

• End the war on drugs and the drug prohibitionist strategy

Colombia has been betting for decades on a war against drugs, boosted by the support of the United States from Plan Colombia, a multimillion-dollar project to carry out this strategy that, however, has not offered effective results in the fight against production of cocaine hydrochloride, which in recent years has remained at maximum figures in the historical series.

That is why, among other things, that since the Final Report of the Truth Commission the actors involved are recommended to abandon this strategy, which has also included spraying with glyphosate -a chemical that has been proven harmful to health- as part of the methods of eradicating illicit crops.

Thus, the report suggests “face the issue of crops from a sustainable development approach that leaves behind the vision of the problem as a matter of national security, definitively renouncing spraying based on evidence”.

In addition, it advocates the strengthening of research to find alternative uses for the coca leaf and marijuana, as well as respect for the ethnic and peasant communities that have used these leaves since their ancestry.

In the short term, the Report recommends “implement a substantial change in drug policytaking into account the evidence, which includes overcoming prohibitionism and moving to regulation of drug markets“.

Also, it suggests “to lead and promote an international debate for the modification of the global regime based on the prohibition of drugs and thus move towards a regulatory regime. Carrying out the International Conference proposed in the Final Peace Agreement is a first step in this direction,” reads the document.

In another line, the Commission suggests to all the actors involved that they guarantee dialogues with the communities, academia and human rights organizations on the implementation of said drug policy in the territories.

Regarding coca crops, specifically, the report bets on “a human rights approach and development and not as a problem of national security”, which implies the demilitarization, by the State, of the strategy against “crops, territories and affected populations”.

About consumptionthe recommendations revolve around the implementation “of the policy against consumption based exclusively on prevention and care, with a public health, human rights and harm reduction approachleaving behind police persecution and criminalization of the consumer and strengthening attention to problematic consumption in urban and rural territories”.

• A more inclusive democracy that includes historically excluded communities

The recommendations on “inclusive, comprehensive and deliberative” democracy in the Final Report aim to put citizen participation at the center.

To this end, the Commission proposes “the exclusion of guns from politics; a broad political system from the social bases, equitable and inclusive of all territories; a political system with guarantees of participation for minority groups, mobilization and social protest; a political system guarantees for social leaders, human rights defenders and political opponents; and a system that promotes measures to include peasants as political subjects, women and ethnic peoples“.

In this sense, the bet is total for the “dialogue and participation as a central tool to resolve conflicts and guarantee fundamental rights”.

To do this, it would first be necessary to develop a strategy to recognize the deficits that Colombian democracy still embodies today. The Report mentions that one way to move in this direction would be the creation of a “National Pact to reject violence and the combination of arms and politics through dialogues that contribute to put an end to political violence from the local to the national”.

For the democratization of the territories, the Commission recommends changes that reverse the underrepresentation of the territories on the country’s periphery “and that have the highest indicators of multidimensional poverty.”

In addition, it is suggestedmeasures to guarantee the exercise of a policy free of violence, especially for social leaders, human rights defenders, people in the process of reincorporation and the so-called political and social opponents“and what do you know? recognize historically excluded groups as political subjects as indigenous peoples, afros, palenqueros, blacks and rom “with measures of legal and material recognition of their territorial rights and their authorities”.