BOGOTA, April 2 (NNN-Prensa Latina) — Congressmen and opposition leaders in Colombia are going to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague to ask for social leaders” justice and support for Special Peace Justice (SPJ).
About 20 associations of Colombians living in Europe the previous week joined the crossing to the Netherlands.
One of these collectives left Paris, carrying an enormous black banner with the names of 462 social leaders, farmers and indigenous people murdered in recent years.
A list of victims of political violence in Colombia is due to be handed over to ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda on Friday.
On Monday, Senators Gustavo Bolivar of the Decent List and Gustavo Petro of the Colombia Humana movement will travel from this capital to The Hague.
Bolivar and Petro will take to Bensouda a letter signed by several legislators from the alternative groups to ask him to begin an investigation into the escalation of social leaders’ crimes they believe have a systematic pattern and high impunity.
According to the Colombian Ombudsman’s Office, from January 2016 to February 2019, 462 social leaders and human rights defenders have been assassinated, 135 of them in the past seven months, coinciding with the government of Ivan Duque.
Discontent among different sectors in Colombia over the presidential objection to the statutory law of the SPJ will also be a key issue of the talks in The Hague.
If there is no SPJ, there will be an International Criminal Court’, Petro said on Twitter. — NNN-PRENSA LATINA
