This month we bring you news from Peru, Colombia, Argentina, Venezuela, Chile, Brazil, Paraguay and Ecuador.
- As foreshadowed in our November newsletter, two Peruvian Human Rights Defenders visited the UK from 10-13 November to raise international pressure in the search for justice for those who were killed or seriously injured during the repression of protests in Peru in 2022-2023.
- Colombia – The Colombian journalist Jineth Bedoya, who was gang raped and tortured by paramilitaries in 2000 and received her latest death threat just days ago, explains why she opposes the government’s ‘total peace’ plan for the reintegration of rapists and violence against female reporters.
- Argentina – Buenos Aires dedicated a week to celebrating diversity, ending with thousands attending a Pride March on November 2nd.
- Chile – The trial against former Carabineros lieutenant colonel Claudio Crespo has now begun; its expected to last up to a year.
- Amnesty International has launched a petition for Brazil to put in place an effective national policy of protection of Human Rights Defenders, Communicators and Environmentalists.
- Amnesty International has published a new Urgent Action calling on the Venezuelan authorities to stop their attacks in the media and through the judicial system on the non-governmental organisation Provea.
COLOMBIA
Jineth Bedoya, Colombian journalist
The Colombian journalist Jineth Bedoya, who was gang raped and tortured by paramilitaries in 2000 and received her latest death threat just days ago, explains why she opposes the government’s ‘total peace’ plan for the reintegration of rapists and violence against female reporters. “I do not understand how you can sit in front of a rapist and give him guarantees in the framework of a social peace, knowing that it is one of the worst crimes.” Bedoya has just launched her documentary on sexual exploitation in Cartagena, titled It’s Not Time to Remain Silent.
The US NGO WOLA reports that the Afro-Colombian Afrorenacer del Micay Community Council in Cauca is losing its rights over its territories, which will be destroyed by a huge dam it did not agree to. ‘Since March 2020, dissident FARC-EP factions have murdered community leaders and internally displaced residents.’ Once the rightful owners of the land were taken out, farmers and community boards not connected to the Afrorenacer del Micay Community Council took over. While the rightful owners have won a court judgement, it has not been enforced by the Colombian authorities.
Colombia Reports that Ivan Marquez, the leader of the FARC dissident group Segunda Marquetalia (SM), has denounced their lead negotiator and deputy leader of the SM who is in peace talks with the government. The SM continues fighting in the south west of Colombia. ‘In a response, President Gustavo Petro said that the “division in the violent groups is a step ahead for peace.”’
The UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances will visit Colombia from 21 November to 5 December 2024 to strengthen accountability and protections against enforced disappearances. The experts will attend exhumations and other proceedings to search for disappeared people, as conducted by the authorities. In addition, the delegation will visit places of deprivation of liberty, such as prisons and detention centres, to examine how they operate their registration system, which is a critical safeguard to prevent enforced disappearances. It will present its report in March.
The Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (ICHR) has resolved that Erika Vanessa Trochez Ortiz and her mother Jazmín Elena Ortiz Urcue are in urgent need of support from the Colombian state to find Erika, protect her mother from threats and report back to the ICHR. Erika was recruited by an armed group in 2023 and is being held against her will. Her mother was held at gunpoint while attempting to find her daughter and she continues to receive death threats. The Colombian state has refused to support them.
Good news! Colombia has finally outlawed child marriages for girls under 18. According to the Guardian, one in four women married in Colombia were married under the age of 18. Those in poverty and in rural and indigenous communities were most affected.
BRAZIL
Tapajós River: indigenous protesters
Amnesty International has launched a petition for Brazil to put in place an effective national policy of protection of Human Rights Defenders, Communicators and Environmentalists. In 2023, Frontline Defenders estimates that 24 human rights defenders were killed in Brazil, more than any other country after Colombia and Mexico. Please sign it and send a copy to the Ambassador, Antonio de Aguiar Patriota, email: ambassador.london@itamaraty.gov.br Embassy of Brazil to the UK 14-16 Cockspur Street London SW1Y 5BL.
The UN has published the report of the Independent Expert Mechanism to Advance Racial Justice and Equality in Law Enforcement following their visit to Brazil. They conclude that Africans and people of African descent continue to face systemic racism in Brazil, as a legacy of enslavement and the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans. ‘Afro-Brazilians are disproportionately affected by poverty, unemployment, and lack of access to quality education. The racial wealth gap is evident, with Black households earning significantly less than their white counterparts.’
Amazon Watch has issued a video of nine indigenous communities demanding the cancellation of the Ferrogrão “grain railway” on the Tapajós River in the Amazon. The Ferrogrão mega-railway project would expand the transportation of soybeans and corn from Brazil’s west-central region. Without any consultation with local communities, it would impact over 49 thousand square kilometres of protected forests, cutting through the Amazon to export commodities through the Tapajós River, intensifying the already catastrophic impacts of the so-called North Arc logistic corridor.
‘Brazil came within a whisker of a far-right military coup and the assassination of a supreme court judge just days before President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took power in January 2023, a federal police report has claimed.’ The Guardian’s report describes ‘a complex, three-year conspiracy that investigators believe was designed to pave the way for a military power grab by using social media to disseminate false claims of electoral fraud that plotters hoped would justify such an intervention in the public eye.’ Only the opposition of Army and Air Force leaders prevented the coup.
ARGENTINA
33rd LGBTIQ+ Pride event in Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires dedicated a week to celebrating diversity, ending with thousands attending a Pride March on November 2nd. Under the slogan “There is no freedom without rights,” marchers paraded from the Plaza de Mayo square demanding a “comprehensive trans law and anti-discrimination law.” Since then, Amnesty International recognized 12 journalists, activists, artists, and for their contribution to the promotion and defence of the rights of LGBTIQ+ people. They commended their “voices that rise to counteract narratives of hate and that in turn inspire other people to defend their rights”.
A reminder that Amnesty International’s 2024 Write for Rights campaign features the case of Joel Paredes. Joel was blinded in one eye by rubber bullets at a peaceful protest. No one has yet been held accountable. Take Action via this online petition. There is a You Tube video in which Joel explains how a peaceful protest was met by unnecessary and excessive force by the police. Many of the protesters, including Joel, were injured. AIUK’s campaign booklet can be downloaded, please send a message of support and solidarity to Joel.
Argentina was the only member country of the United Nations to vote against a draft resolution on Indigenous Peoples’ rights. The draft resolution is a bid to reinforce international commitments to protecting the rights of indigenous communities. It focuses on fundamental aspects such as ensuring access to justice, environmental protection and the preservation of their spiritual beliefs, ancestral knowledge, and languages. The resolution stresses the importance of free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples in decisions affecting their territories and natural resources.
A few days later Argentina was the only country to vote against a United Nations resolution promoting the end of all forms of online violence against women and girls. During the UN General Assembly session, the Argentine mission argued that the resolution contained ambiguous terms such as “hate speech,” “misinformation,” and “disinformation” that could be used “abusively” to restrict freedom of expression.
Argentina appeared before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to address three thematic hearings requested by civil society organizations on the state of human rights in the country. The key issues raised were memory, truth, and justice; prevention, punishment, and eradication of gender-based violence; and social and food policies. Secretary of Human Rights Alberto Baños did not address the concerns raised by civil society organizations and the IACHR. He acknowledged institutional degradation and downsizing in key areas, but failed to recognize impact of these measures.
CHILE
Jorge Salvo was blinded in one eye by police teargas. In July 2023 Salvo took his own life.
The trial against former Carabineros lieutenant colonel Claudio Crespo has now begun; its expected to last up to a year. The prosecution hold him responsible for the shotgun blast that blinded Gustavo Gatica during the peaceful protests of 2019. Meanwhile, as the 5th anniversary passes, thousands of other victims are trapped between hopelessness and impunity. Sebastián Méndez, 38, who was blinded in his right eye by a projectile fired by a police, took his own life on the anniversary, the 5th victim known to have done so.
The National Institute of Human Rights (INDH) was set up aim to bring justice and prevent the recurrence of crimes against humanity committed during military dictatorship of the 70s and 80s. Last month the Chamber of Deputies approved and sent to the Senate a budget bill for 2025, which has no funding the INDH. A wide range of organizations and individuals have called on Congress to restore funds, saying this is a serious attack not only on that institution and its staff, but also on human rights defenders and citizens.
The UN Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Tlaleng Mofokeng, is in Chile to observe best practices and challenges in the right to health. The visit will focus on access to healthcare and underlying determinants of health, with particular attention to marginalised populations. Mofokeng will visit public hospitals and clinics, a detention centre and hold a wide range of meetings to assess the availability, accessibility, acceptability and quality of healthcare. The Special Rapporteur will present her report to the UN Human Rights Council in June 2025.
PERU
Ayacucho Victims Association
As foreshadowed in our November newsletter, two Peruvian Human Rights Defenders visited the UK from 10-13 November to raise international pressure in the search for justice for those who were killed or seriously injured during the repression of protests in Peru in 2022-2023. Yovana Mendoza Huarancca, Vice-President of the Ayacucho Victims Association, and Mario Iquita Chambi, Representative of the Juliaca Victims Association, were accompanied by Vanessa Cuentas Advocacy Officer at AI Peru and the visit was jointly organised with our friends at the Peru Support Group (PSG).
The programme included a meeting with officials at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, an event in Parliament chaired by PSG president Lord Alderdice and an event at the Human Rights Action Centre (HRAC). Among the attendees at the latter was the new minister with responsibility for Latin America at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, Baroness Chapman. She thanked Yovanna and Mario for their testimonies, their strength and their bravery in sharing their stories. Both Foreign Office representatives and parliamentarians said they would be raising their concerns about the slow progress in the investigations with their Peruvian counterparts.
The delegation went on from London to Spain to meet the Spanish foreign minister and to Geneva to address diplomatic representatives to the UN and UN human rights experts.
You can still sign our petition here. You can watch a recording of the event at HRAC here.
Venezuela
Amnesty International has published a new Urgent Action calling on the Venezuelan authorities to stop their attacks in the media and through the judicial system on the non-governmental organisation Provea. While a high-ranking government official threatened them directly on a TV show a few weeks prior, the Forensic Criminal Investigations Police (CICPC, in Spanish) has now issued a summons to Oscar Murillo, PROVEA’s general coordinator, to give testimony in a case of an alleged crime under the highly contested ‘anti-hatred law’.
Amnesty International has published new research exposing the arbitrary detention, torture, ill treatment, and gross violations of the right to a fair trial of six children in Venezuela committed between 90 and 31 July. Four months on, at least 198 children remain subjected to either unfair detention, trumped up criminal charges, or the serious mental and physical consequences of abuse perpetrated by the Venezuelan authorities. In light of this situation, Amnesty International Secretary General, Agnès Callamard, said:
“When it comes to protecting and respecting human rights, we have come to expect the worst from Nicolas Maduro’s government. Detaining, torturing, prosecuting, and punishing children crosses a line no state should ever cross. We demand the immediate and unconditional release and redress for all children currently suffering the endless cruelty of the Venezuelan authorities.”
The United Nations Human Rights Committee has ordered the Venezuelan authorities “to refrain from destroying” the voting tallies from July’s presidential election. The Human Rights Committee – a UN body made up of 18 independent experts – said it was investigating allegations of electoral fraud following a complaint brought by a law firm on behalf of a Venezuelan voter.
OUR TEAM AND YOU
All the best,
South America Team – Richard Crosfield (Colombia and Brazil), David Rogers (Argentina and Chile), James Baird (Venezuela) and Graham Minter (rest of South America). And please don’t forget that you can follow us on our Facebook page and X Twitter.
