Derechos Humanos en Colombia - http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/colombia

The following is the text of the letter that the highly respected Jesuit 
priest and Executive Director of Justicia y Paz (an umbrella organization 
of more than 55 religious organizations in Colombia) wrote to the highest 
authorities of the country in relation to the Uraba region.

Justicia y Paz
Religious Conference of Colombia
Intercongregational  Commission for Justice and Peace
Santafe de Bogota

March 12, 1997


To the following:

Dr. Ernesto Samper Pizano
President of the Republic

Dr. Horacio Serpa Uribe
Minister of the Interior

Dra. Maria Emma Mejia
Minister of Foreign Relations

Dr. Carlos Medellin Becerra
Minister of Law and Justice

Dr. Alfonso Valdivieso Sarmiento
Public Prosecutor of the Nation

Dr. Jaime Bernal Cuellar
Attorney General of the Nation

Dr. Jose Fernando Castro Caicedo
Public Defender

Dr. Carlos Vicente de Roux Rengifo
Presidential Advisor for Human Rights

With all due consideration:

With profound consternation permit me to again call your attention to the
current situation that the region of Uraba is suffering.

Since the past 23 of February the residents of more than 15 villages of the
Bajo Atrato, the majority of them belonging to the municipality of
Riosucio, of the department of Choco, began to be forced through violent
means to abandon their dwellings and their livelihoods by groups that
identified themselves in some cases as "paramilitaries" and in other cases
as "self defense groups."  Some of those villages, such as Salaqui,
Tamboral, Perquerre and others were bombed in order to force the
displacement of the population.  In the village of Vijao, on Feb. 27, they
assassinated a young man Marino Lopez with extreme cruelty, dismembering
his body in the presence of various members of the community.  The
paramilitaries recommended to some of the groups that were fleeing their
communities in terror that they direct themselves to Turbo (Antioquia);
that there the police would pick them up in the port and that the mayor's
office would show them where they could stay.

In this moment the stadium of Turbo is overflowing with several hundred
displaced families and another large group of displaced families is found
in Quibdo.

General Rito Alejo Del Rio, Commander of the XVII Brigade of the Army,
talked  last week with the displaced people that were taking shelter in the
stadium of Turbo and when he was asked to guarantee their safe return to
their zones of origin, he responded that he could not guarantee that, since
that zone was undergoing military operations and was being submitted to a
general "sweeping."  Therefore, there is no doubt about the close
relationship between the National Army and the paramilitary groups that
terrorize the region and have identified themselves as responsible for the
criminal displacement of massive numbers of peasants and for extrajudicial
executions and forced disappearances.

This same coodination of action (between the Public Forces and the
paramilitary forces) is demonstrated in a similar fashion by what has been
happening in the unincorporated town of San Jose, in the municipality of
Apartado.   A paramilitary  blockade has interrupted traffic for the last
several weeks, between the urban area of Apartado and the town of San Jose.
There, all those who are traveling are subject to  searches and on
occasion  the goods they are carrying  are stolen under the pretext of
"supplying the guerrillas."  On Feb. 28 such a paramilitary group entered
the hamlet of San Jose at  6:00 am and obliged all the residents to leave
their houses and line up in the main street.  Then the paramilitaries
checked the residents' identification papers and took with them three
members of the community:  Don Ruben Antonio Villa, his son Antonio Villa
and Don Miguel Haya.  Later they forced Don Guillermo Serna to get off a
public transportation vehicle and they took him also.  These people were
later assassinated and buried at the edge of the highway.  One day before
they had assassinated the driver R. Henao.

In spite of the pleadings of the widows and family members, the Public
Prosecutor's Office of Apartado, in the beginning, declined to exhume the
bodies and investigate the crimes.  The courage of the Mayor of Apartado,
Gloria Isabel Cuartas, who in the face of such a refusal went with the
widows to personally search for the place where the victims had been
buried, and pressured the Public Prosecutor's office to conduct the
exhumations.   When the Public Prosecutor's staff ( accompanied by a large
contingent of military and police escorts) arrived at the site of the
burial,  there were paramilitaries there who exchanged friendly greetings
with the officials of the Public Forces using the most familiar kind of
language.  Such obvious signs of an immoral alliance caused profound
repugnance on the part of the Mayor and the family members of the victims,
which causes them to leave the scene immediately.  The close ties between
the institutions of the State and criminal groups who have submitted the
region to a blood bath were demonstrated openly in this scene.

As on previous occasions, I reiterate to you these charges are not directed
to ask for an "investigation", since a long and painful experience of
seeking justice has demonstrated to us that the only results harvested are:
greater risks for the victims, family members and witnesses and greater
impunity for those responsible for the violence.

What I do ask for is that the national Government take urgent
administrative measures to remove from their positions the commanders of
the Public Forces who in such an evident form have acted in coordination
with the paramilitary structures of the region.  I ask that that they be
replaced by officials that abide by the rule of the constitution and the
principles of International Justice that protect human dignity.   For the
more than 500 families displaced from the Bajo Atrato, I ask that their
properties and means of supporting themselves, of which they were unjustly
deprived, be returned to them immediately.

With profound grief and pain,


Father Javier Giraldo M, S.J.
Executive Secretary

cc:
*High Commissioner for Human Rights of the United Nations
*Representative and Committees of the United Nations
*Interamerican Commission for Human Rights- OEA
*International and national Human Rights organizations
*Diplomatic representatives registered with the Colombian government