Colombia Human Rights Activity Year Four Quarter Three Report

This period was marked by a series of protests, known as the paro nacional, which broke out in response to the government's policies. The protests, which began in Bogotá and departmental capitals, expanded to address a wide range of issues, including social and economic inequities. Despite a general decrease in homicides rates and other key human rights indicators, HRA's prioritized populations continued to experience troubling patterns of human rights violations. The United Nations Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNOHCHR) confirmed 107 homicides of leaders and defenders in 2019, and the Ombudsman's Office reported that over a thousand leaders were under threat of attack. USAID's Human Rights Activity (HRA) is particularly concerned by the threats and attacks on community action board (JAC) leaders participating in government programs created by the 2016 peace agreement. HRA's commitment to promoting a sustainable culture of human rights continued with its support of education and policy initiatives that empower marginalized groups. The program impacted thousands of Colombians through partnerships with the Human Rights Schools in Meta and Tolima, the Escuela Superior de Administración Pública's (ESAP) diploma course in Antioquia, Cauca, Córdoba, Meta, and Nariño, the Universidad Javeriana de Cali in Cauca, and the Human Rights and Peacebuilding Olympics in Antioquia, Cauca, and Córdoba. HRA also bolstered its efforts to encourage renewed cooperation between the Colombian government and civil society by creating opportunities for civil society leaders to voice their concerns to the government and contribute to policies prioritizing human rights. In line with the program's dedication to improving protection measures for social leaders and human rights defenders, HRA played a key role in the Ministry of the Interior's initiatives to include civil society leaders' contributions for the development of a national protection and guarantees public policy for leaders and defenders. As a practical response to the crisis of violence against social leaders and human rights defenders, HRA continued to work at the national level with the National Protection Unit (NPU) to re-engineer their individual protection program to more efficiently provide protection measures for leaders and defenders. HRA's partnership with the NPU also made progress towards using technology to protect leaders and defenders through the development of two smartphone applications designed by the winners of June's Campus Party hackathon. Regionally, the program strengthened its self-protection strategy with vulnerable groups, including women and ethnic minorities, and initiated an expansion to the strategy that will impact JAC, PDET, and PNIS leaders. To advocate for the importance of social leaders' work and protection to the Colombian population in general, HRA supported anti-stigmatization media campaigns in Antioquia, Cauca, Córdoba, and Nariño. Furthermore, USAID, the Ombudsman's Office, and other civil society organizations (CSOs) joined the Inspector General Office's (IGO) Lidera La Vida campaign to promote respect for the work of leaders and defenders and advocate for protection of their lives. In support of advancing towards a society that respects human rights, HRA continued to strengthen the Attorney General's Office (AGO) capacities for reducing impunity for perpetrators of human rights violations. Focusing on cases of gender-based violence (GBV) and threats against leaders and defenders, HRA consultants worked with the AGO to improve case investigation strategies and define criteria for prioritizing cases to prosecute. HRA grant support also allowed CSOs in Antioquia, Caquetá, and Tolima to strategically litigate key cases of violence against women and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) people, with notable advances this quarter in the prosecution of these cases.