Petition to include the displaced population of Alto San Jorge in the Register of Displaced Persons

27.09.11

By ASOCBAC
Translated by IPO

Since September 16th of this year the campesino and indigenous population of Alto San Jorge has been displaced by glyphosate fumigations on their land, including the Zenú reserve and the Nudo de Paramillo national park. Those affected have stated that the fumigation destroyed their legal food crops, which primarily consist of rice.

One of the factors which caused this forced displacement has been one Army official’s continued abuse of authority. Capitan Cuervo is an officer in the region, and has been the subject of multiple complaints regarding human rights violations and infractions of International Humanitarian Law. The leaders of the Communal Action Committees have had their rights to free association, participation, and autonomy systematically infringed upon by Capitan Cuervo, which violates the International Humanitarian Law’s principle of distinction.

The make-up of the objective causes of this displacement, after a week of encampment in la Granja in Puerto Libertador, Córdoba, has been superficially evaluated by Acción Social (the state body which evaluates displacement), which has refused to classify this dramatic situation as a large-scale forced displacement, and which has also denied humanitarian aid to the displaced. Acción Social asserts that Law 387 of 1997 does not consider glyphosate fumigations to be a cause of displacement, nor can the Colombian state or its members be said to be the agents of such an action.

The situation grows worse each day, and with each fumigation the number of withering crops grows, and more campesinos and indigenous, many of them women and children, arrive at the temporary settlement in Puerto Libertador.

Moreover the head of the Defensoría del Pueblo and the Procuraduría (the human rights advocacy offices of the Colombian government) has been conspicuously absent during this period.

PROPOSED CONSIDERATIONS

Although Law 387’s specific restrictions do not work in the displaced victims’ favor in this case, “All sides in the conflict have neglected Representative Francis M. Deng’s call for them to respect humanitarian law and to avoid any displacement caused by the armed conflict. Aerial fumigations of illegal crops do cause forced displacement, but they are not recognized as doing so by the authorities.”

However “From April 28, 2005, approximately 5,000 campesinos from nine rural villages in the municipality of Samaná, Caldas, have been forcibly displaced to nearby towns as a result the aerial fumagations of more than a thousand hectares of farmland. These fumigations affect all food crops. Absent any commitment from the government to compensate farmers and to cease fumigations, the campesinos do not consider it safe to return to their land,” as the Interagency Director of the UN’s Division of Internal Displacement has recommended that the register of displaced persons “should include those displaced by fumigations, as well as those who are victim of intra-urban displacement.”

As such, the decision T 025 of 2007 and its complimentary decisions (especially 004 of 2009) from the Colombian Constitutional Court regarding “The protection of the fundamental rights those displaced by the armed conflict, or those in risk of displacement, in the framework revising the unconstitutional sentence T 025 of 2004”, includes an opinion on “Fumigations of illegal crops without the sufficient requirements of prior warning ordered by the Constitutional Court in decision SU 383 of 2003, and which indiscriminately effect legal crops and the community’s food supply, as well as the natural environment (used for hunting, fishing, or forestry). The fumigation processes, themselves a response to the increase of illegal crops in indigenous territories, have been the object of multiple complains from numerous indigenous communities throughout the country, in the sense that the fumigations have brought negative health affects because of the contamination of food, domestic animals and the water supply, as well as bringing skin and respiratory problems among members of those communities.”

Regarding violations of International Humanitarian Law (such as the second factor that caused this forced displacement—the aforementioned officer’s abuse of authority), it states “The armed conflict has generated the impossibility of free movement in the region, which affects both the campesinos’ collective work and the cultural aspects that depend on it. It also affects the education system, as schools are taken over and teachers threatened or killed. Access to medical treatment is also made difficult by blockades, imprisonment, threats, and accusations of guerrilla involvement. This situation has led to the loss of trust within members of the community, which affects the population’s cohesion and its socio-cultural traditions.”

Lastly, the decision Auto 004, which applies to the present situation, forcefully states that “The impact of the armed conflict is apparent in battles, assassinations, forced recruitment, disappearances of leaders and local authorities, blockades, evictions, fumigations, etc, all of which constitutes the everyday context of displacement. The displacement of indigenous groups and afro-Colombians always involves the violation of those populations’ constitutional rights, including their collective right to their culture and territory.”

As such, the Supreme Court has admitted that one cause of the displacement of indigenous, afro-Colombian, and campesino rural communities has been the aerial fumigation of their lands, along with the other causes created by Colombia’s internal armed conflict.

It is also necessary to take into account the characterization of the victims, as put forth by Law 1448 of June 2011, in which the third articles defines “VICTIMS. The law considers victims those who have individually or collectively suffered harm from events that have occurred since January 1st, 1985, as a consequence of the infraction of International Humanitarian Law or grave violations of International Human Rights regulations, occurring in the internal armed conflict. They are also victims those whose spouse, permanent partner, or direct family member has been killed or disappeared. In the case of no direct family, those of the second degree are considered victims.” Regarding the acts which lead to this particular forced displacement: any abuse of authority or infraction of International Humanitarian Law by state security forces on indigenous or campesino land, is at that time a violation by one of the armed actors of the Colombian conflict, which includes fumigations—a military operation designed to weaken the operational capacity of their enemy, and which indiscriminately affects the civilian population’s health and food supply. The result is such that these fumigations have been carried out in Indigenous Zenú lands indiscriminately and without prior warning.

As such, the current situation in Alto San Jorge which today is also playing out in Puerto Libertador, qualifies as a Forced Displacement for the above reasons.

For this reason ASOCBAC, in solidarity with the campesinos and indigenous Zenú of Alto San Jorge, asks the Colombian government to respect the rights of the population that has been displaced by these fumigations and abuses of authority. We ask that their declaration of large-scale displacement be received, that they be included in the register of displaced persons, and that they be provided with emergency humanitarian aid—of which they have the right according to law 387, as well as decision T 025 and its complimentary documents.

Sincerely,
On behalf of the campesino community,
ANROBIS ZAPATA, Spokesperson. President of the Local Action Committee of Bocas del Río Sucio.
On behalf of the indigenous community,
ISRAEL MANUEL AGUILAR SOLANO, Zenú Governor Cacique Mayor of Alto San Jorge, South Cordobá.

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