Colombian human rights lawyer Germán Romero Sánchez receives death threat

The Peace Brigades International-Colombia Project has posted on its Facebook page about a death threat against lawyer Germán Romero Sánchez.

El Espectador reports that Romero, who represents victims of state agents, received a death threat on October 3 via his landline telephone and that his computer (with sensitive information about his cases) was stolen previous to that.

The same number has called Romero’s landline twice sent then, but they are silent when the telephone is answered.

That article also notes that Romero represents those affected by the Palace of Justice case, the construction of the Hidroituango hydroelectric dam as well as journalist Claudia Julieta Duque (who is accompanied by PBI-Colombia).

dhColombia (the Network of Human Rights Defenders in Colombia) says, “There is no doubt that the threats, harassment, follow-up and theft of information that the lawyer suffers today, have their origin in judicial activities and representation of victims of serious human rights violations that advances.”

dhColombia has also stated, “We reiterate the call to the Colombian State and demand from the competent authorities, to adopt serious, appropriate and effective measures that guarantee the life, integrity and security of the lawyer Germán Romero, his family, of the victims he represents.”

For further context, the Inter-Church Justice and Peace Commission (which is accompanied by PBI-Colombia) tweeted on September 22 this article Context of persecution and theft of information to representative of victims of lawyer Germán Romero Sánchez, Member of dhColombia.

Peace Brigades International-United Kingdom has also highlighted their concern about the security situation for Romero in this tweet.

You can follow dhColombia for updates via Twitter here.

Further reading: Peace Brigades accompanies at-risk lawyers and criminalized human rights defenders.