Global Overview 2015: People internally displaced by conflict and violence - Protracted displacement in Colombia

Ongoing challenges despite peace process

Colombia's experience brings the challenges of resolving protracted displacement amid ongoing violence into sharp focus, even in a middle-income country with a strong legal framework for IDPs' protection.

According to official statistics, at least six million people have been displaced over more than six decades of conflict. In 2014, 137,200 people were newly displaced, 403,700 registered as IDPs displaced in 2014 and previous years^[52] and 7,100 were forcibly evicted. More than 50 per cent of IDPs live in informal urban settlements.^[53] Displacement happens throughout the country, but is highly concentrated along the Pacific coast and the border with Venezuela.

The ongoing peace process between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia can contribute to ending protracted displacement.^[54] A partial agreement on the drugs trade was reached in May, and nearly 29,000 former combatants were assisted under the government's reintegration programme between October 2013 and September 2014.^[55] There has been little improvement, however, in overall security.

The conflict rumbles on, and at least 40 criminal gangs, many of which have morphed out of post-demobilisation armed groups, fight over urban territory. They terrorise the civilian population with killings, disappearances, torture, extortion, intimidation and sexual violence, and drive intra-urban displacement, particularly in Bogotá, Buenaventura, Cúcuta, Quibdó and Tumaco.^[56] IDPs in areas under BACRIM control are highly vulnerable and live in dire circumstances with inadequate housing, scarce employment and no access to public services.^[57]

Public opinion remains divided over whether the peace process will succeed.^[58] Re-establishing trust, particularly in institutions, the rule of law and the security forces is paramount, and key to upholding IDPs' and other victims' rights to truth, justice and reparation.

Colombia has made significant progress in addressing displacement at the judicial, legal and institutional level, and particularly protracted displacement. Transitional justice mechanisms, incipient durable solutions and disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration policies have been implemented. Efforts are hampered, however, by rampant insecurity and structural obstacles, and victims' reparations have been slow to materialise.

The Constitutional Court and local tribunals issued 1,586 rulings in IDPs' favour on land restitution in 2014,^[59] an indication of authorities' failure to fulfil their commitments in terms of access to land, compensation and the return of illegally acquired property. The passing of draft bills 022 and 129 of 2014 would increase the jurisdiction of military and police tribunals to try human rights abuses and violations of international human rights law by the security forces, and as such would be a setback to the transitional justice system.

Property restitution is key to resolving protracted displacement, but in Colombia it has become a source of conflict. In the first three months of 2014, 16 major displacements took place in priority restitution areas.^[60] Since 2011, 64,815 requests for land restitution have been lodged, but as of the end of June 2014 only 2,687 had been granted.^[61]

Land grabs and forced evictions associated with large infrastructure and resource extraction projects continue to cause displacement, particularly of indigenous people, African-Colombians and farmers.^[62] Corrupt local authorities, notaries and businesspeople, and the presence of illegal armed groups have hampered restitution. Human rights advocates, land activists and community leaders have been killed and threatened.^[63]

Ninety-two per cent of IDPs live below the poverty line, of whom 33 per cent live in extreme poverty, which reflects the lack of support they receive in trying to re-establish their lives. Of those who applied for government assistance to return or relocate, only 26 per cent have achieved their goals, of whom only 15 per cent felt the process had been conducted with dignity.^[64]

UNHCR, UNDP and the Colombian authorities are running the Transitional Solutions Initiative with 17 displaced communities, involving their return to rural areas, local integration in urban areas and relocation schemes.^[65] Despite the legal and institutional frameworks in place, the strength of the government and the long-standing presence of international humanitarian organisations, there are still weaknesses at the local level that hinder the prevention of displacement, the implementation of solutions and humanitarian access.^[66]

Without a strategy to improve local capabilities in the pursuit of durable solutions, better target humanitarian assistance and strengthen the independence of international organisations as monitoring bodies, the end of the conflict, if it comes, is unlikely to mean peace or an end to protracted displacement.

52. The 2013 Constitutional ruling (award 119) that people displaced by BACRIM should be included in the victims' registry prompted many IDPs to come forward. This, however, has had the effect of reducing their visibility as they are now considered as "one of many victims' groups". Brookings, Changing Times: The International Response to Internal Displacement in Colombia, 12 January 2015, available at: http://goo.gl/pz4i3c

53. Maite de Muller, UNHCR TSI report indicates that 52 per cent of IDPs live in urban areas

54. From January to May 2014, 382 armed incidents occurred, compared with 907 over the same period in 2013. Fundacioón Paz y Reconciliacioón, La tercera tregua: una comparación del cese unilateral de hostilidades de las FARC, 28 May 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/e1QQWq

55. ACR, Reintegracion en Colombia, hechos & datos, September 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/TTdx6T

56. Brookings, 2015, op. cit.

57. Brookings, Building Peace in the Midst of Conflict: Improving Security and Finding Durable Solutions to Displacement in Colombia, 16 September 2014, available at: http://g oo.gl/qYlVxx

58. Brookings, Security Sector Reform and Ending Displacement: Important, but Neglected, Connections, 17 September 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/ox3lv6

59. Land Restitution Unit, Informe trimestral de gestión, available at: http://goo.gl/Qz9e4s

60. CODHES, Boletín de síntesis del conflicto armado y crisis humanitaria por desplazamiento forzado en zonas microfocalizadas para restitución de tierras y derechos territoriales, 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/JlO06G

61. Amnesty International, A Land Title is not Enough: Ensuring sustainable land restitution in Colombia, November 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/uijCah

62. Ibid

63. According to Amnesty International, "paramilitaries, often working with others with a political and/or economic interest in the land being claimed, as well as drug trafficking gangs, have been primarily responsible for threats against and killings of land claimants and land activists". At least 30 human rights defenders were killed in the first half of 2014 and more that 100 threatened. Ibid

64. Integral Unit for Victims' Attention and Reparation, Informe analítico sobre la medición de indicadores de goce efectivo de derecho de la población desplazada, no date, available at: http://goo.gl/l3Z0Fq

65. UNHCR, 2015 UNHCR country operations profile – Colombia, 2015, available at: http://goo.gl/wZDac3; UNHCR et al, Construyendo soluciones sostenibles, May 2013, available at: http://goo.gl/Dlu7LC

66. Brookings, 2015, op.cit.