PBI-Colombia accompanies the Justice and Peace Commission at dialogue with Afro-Colombian communities impacted by Operation Genesis

On April 13, PBI-Colombia tweeted:

“We accompany @Justiciaypazcol [the Inter-Church Commission for Justice and Peace] in the #Cacarica [river basin] in the dialogue between the ethnic communities victims #Cavida [the Community of Self-Determination, Life, and Dignity of Cacarica] and #Clamores and the State, 10 years after the sentence of @CorteIDH [Inter-American Court of Human Rights], in the presentation of a dialogue plan for reparation collective towards #peace and #justice.”

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruled in 2013 that the State violated the American Convention on Human Rights when the Colombian armed forces attacked inhabitants of the Cacarica river basin during an offensive that took place on February 24 through February 27, 1997, called Operation Genesis.

PBI-Colombia has explained: “Operation Genesis included the participation of the Army, Navy, Airforce and National Police, in coordination with paramilitaries from the Cordoba and Uraba Self Defence Forces (AUC). The military and paramilitary operation resulted in over 70 crimes, including murders and enforced disappearances. As a result, around 3,500 people from the 23 communities of the Cacarica river basin were forcibly displaced.”

WOLA has also noted: “Operation Genesis formed part of a larger paramilitary political effort to displace Afro-Colombians from their territories to facilitate the entry and expansion of oil palm plantations throughout the department of Choco.”

Two years after their displacement in February 1997, the communities of Cacarica obtained collective ownership of their lands, to which they returned in 2000. There, they established the Community of Self-Determination, Life, and Dignity of Cacarica (CAVIDA).

The PBI-Colombia Project has accompanied the Inter-Church Justice and Peace Commission since 1994.