The civil society organizations that make up the Mesa Territorial de Garantías in the department of Putumayo, convened the Verification Mission, carried out last April 2, to the village of El Alto Remanso in the municipality of Puerto Leguízamo, which was accompanied by national and international human rights organizations, along with journalists from various national media. After listening attentively to the accounts of the community, direct and indirect witnesses, and making a connection of the different facts, we confirmed that:

On March 28 at around 7:00 a.m., an Extrajudicial Execution took place, which the Ministry of Defense pretended to present as a successful operation with legitimate targets.

As we have explained, El Alto Remanso is a village whose community is organized around a Community Action Board recognized by the Government Secretariat of Puerto Leguízamo, a community that also exists in the municipality with a multicultural logic, due to the high and important presence of indigenous communities and peoples, with whom they coexist and share.

There was indeed an armed incursion, which resulted in the murder of community and indigenous inhabitants, community leaders and indigenous authorities, as well as other people wounded and missing, including several minors, which is reiterative in this type of armed action. These facts show a massacre carried out within the framework of a National Army operation, which forces the community, families and indigenous people to move and violates IHL and IHRL.

We have also established that there have been other aggressions to human rights, such as: physical and psychological abuse, confinement, illegal searches, stigmatization and displacement of a hundred families; in addition to the configuration of other crimes such as theft of community and personal property, as well as obstruction of justice.

In terms of the subsequent procedures, a series of irregularities were committed that reflect the intention of accommodating the facts to the official version, such as that of the bodies or the late presence of the Prosecutor’s Office, who began the investigations five days after the events, days in which there was a permanent presence of the Army and constant rain, leaving at risk the collection of information without being able to determine time, manner and place of the events and materializing the possible impunity of the same.

To conclude:

By all accounts, it is clear that the Military Forces flagrantly violated International Humanitarian Law (IHL), arguing the development of an operation that sacrificed the lives of communal and indigenous inhabitants.

In the village of El Remanso, the violation of the Right to Life was experienced in a broad and general manner, and the Protection of the Right to Life cannot be suspended by any case or circumstance as established in international Covenants, Treaties and Conventions. In this sense, we insist that, beyond the possible presence of illegal armed actors in the community, nothing justifies the perverse military operation that was carried out and triggered the vile murder of members of the peasant and indigenous community.

This extrajudicial execution against the population of El Remanso and neighboring communities participating in the bazaar was also directed against human groups highly protected by international human rights law, such as indigenous peoples, social leaders and minors, who were killed in the event. It should be noted that these practices are of great concern to the Mission, given that they are systematic and respond to the same patterns of behavior already investigated at other times in the territory.

The Verification Mission will prepare a more detailed report, based on the context and the events that took place there, which we will make public in the next few days.

Finally we request:

– To the Minister of Defense and the national government, to rectify the labels with which they have sullied the dignity of the communities of this sector of Puerto Leguízamo and to recognize, on the contrary, their JACs constituted by law. The recognition also of the indigenous peoples and their entities, and the cessation also of the physical and cultural extermination against the indigenous peoples, which constitutes an ethnocide, a crime against humanity.

– That the Prosecutor’s Office and especially the Special Investigation Unit conduct an impartial, autonomous and effective investigation. That the testimonies are not collected with the presence of the military who were the aggressors.

– Activate the Urgent Search Mechanism for persons reported missing, given that, according to the accounts, there are people who disappeared after the Army raid on the day the events occurred.

– To the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation, of the specialized unit for Human Rights, to initiate a disciplinary investigation against members of the National Army involved in the military operation, directed against the civilian population of the community of El Remanso.

– To the international community to accompany this community and provide humanitarian aid given the humanitarian crisis they are experiencing as a result of displacement and the impossibility of working.

The Mission welcomes the proposal of the Mesa Territorial de Garantías to call for the construction of a Humanitarian Agreement that contributes to the eradication of violence and allows in coexistence the materialization of the effective enjoyment of Rights, the preservation of life and the social and political stability of the Territory, in the urgent invitation of the peasant, indigenous, communal and afro-descendant communities so that we continue on the path towards COMPLETE PEACE AND SOCIAL JUSTICE.

Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil de la Mesa Territorial de Garantías (Civil Society Organizations of the Territorial Roundtable of Guarantees) –

Organización Nacional de Pueblos Indígenas de la Amazonía Colombiana OPIAC (National Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the Colombian Amazon) –

Colectivo de Abogados José Alvear Restrepo (José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers’ Collective) – Comisión Inter Eclesial de Justicia y Paz (Inter-Ecclesial Justice and Peace Commission) –

Asociación Minga – Coordinación Colombia Europa Estados Unidos ( Coordination Colombia Europe United States ) – Alianza de

Organizaciones para la Cooperación Internacional (Alliance of

Organizations for International Cooperation) – Plataforma Derechos Democracia y Desarrollo (Democracy and Development Rights Platform

Development)

Given in Puerto Asis, on April 3, 2022.