March 9th |

For the first time, Colombia’s Peace Tribunal indicted 10 mid-level commanders of the now-defunct Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia guerrillas for the recruitment and use of minors in the armed conflict, as well as 13 other war crimes and crimes against humanity, including murders, disappearances, executions and the use of anti-personnel mines.

Wednesday’s indictment is the first in what is known as Case 05, which investigates crimes committed during five decades of conflict in northern Cauca and southern Valle del Cauca, two departments in the southwest of the country where the FARC’s Western Bloc operated.

The Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), the court created after the signing of the peace agreement between the state and the FARC in 2016, has 10 major cases open in which it is trying former FARC combatants, members of the security forces, state agents and civilians.

At least 18,677 children were victims of forced recruitment during Colombia’s armed conflict, according to the court’s preliminary figures. That crime is being investigated separately in a case that covers the entire country but was included in the charges brought against the 10 former guerrillas on Wednesday.

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The court found that the FARC used “recruitment as a political-military strategy as an armed organization,” according to the indictment, especially since the late 1990s, with a “significant increase” since 2011.

Former top FARC commanders have acknowledged that the guerrillas forcibly recruited minors, but have denied that this was a systematic practice.

In the area, most of the minors who joined the guerrilla ranks were indigenous or Afro-descendants, according to voluntary accounts from several of the ex-guerrillas. Former combatant Efrén Núñez Pulido acknowledged before the Court a policy of recruiting minors, among them an “indigenous girl under 15 years of age who was later shot”.

The minors, detailed the Tribunal, were taken through deception and economic offers and many of their families lost track of them or later received their lifeless bodies.

The Court also found that in northern Cauca and southern Valle del Cauca the now defunct guerrillas committed deliberate attacks against the civilian population and aimed to “declare a provisional government” in the area and then “expand their presence and obtain power through the use of arms”.

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With its actions, the former guerrillas caused deaths and disappearances of indigenous people and peasants who were accused of being informants or leaders against the insurgency, displaced thousands of people and used anti-personnel mines to achieve territorial and social control and confine the communities, according to the Court.

The former FARC carried out “councils of war” and “executions” within its ranks in which several of its members were shot for going against the rules. According to the Court, the FARC disregarded the Additional Protocol to the Geneva Conventions “since they killed minors and persons who were brought in solely for the purpose of being killed without guarantees”.

In its investigation, the Tribunal compared 28 reports and publications from State entities, indigenous and victims’ organizations, as well as 91 versions from former guerrillas.

The ex-combatants have 30 working days to acknowledge or reject the accusations. If they deny responsibility, they may defend themselves with a lawyer, but if they are found guilty in a trial they could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. If they accept responsibility, they would receive sanctions that do not imply imprisonment.

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