14 May 2020

[Unofficial translation of excerpt by the BHHRC. See the original article in Spanish here]

...The report seeks to provide the Commission for the Clarification of the Truth, Coexistence and Non-Repetition (CEV) with a perspective from civil society and the human rights movement on the behaviour of private companies in Colombia in the context of the armed conflict. It mentions close to 50 cases of human rights violations committed against individuals, organizations and communities opposed to business projects that affect territory, the environment and labour rights. The information presented shows that the economic transformations that the country has undergone in recent decades have altered the dynamics of the armed conflict, resulting in the growing involvement of powerful business sectors in human rights violations, and in a wide impact on the civilian population of the regions in which their operations took place. Thus, it seeks to contribute new elements to the understanding of the complexity of the conflict in Colombia and the socio-political violence, and of the barriers that have historically been forged to fully guarantee individual and collective rights. The report was constructed on the basis of judicial documents and secondary literature that relate, from the perspective of the victims, the ways in which they were affected by the involvement of various companies in the extractive, mining, energy, food, industrial and livestock sectors in the armed conflict. In that order, it demonstrates the impacts of such practices on communities, territories and society as a whole, as well as their link to various factors that contributed to the persistence of the conflict, the deepening of forced displacement and the weakening of democracy...