COLOMBIA: Paramilitaries in Colombia are deeply unhappy with a new court ruling, writes Ana Carrigan
Colombia's constitutional court has struck down key provisions of a new law governing the demobilisation of the country's right-wing paramilitaries. Last week's ruling found unconstitutional clauses that shielded them from serious criminal penalties and has plunged the country's paramilitary demobilisation process deeper into crisis.
In April, Colombia's peace commissioner, Luis Carlos Restrepo, announced the winding up of Colombia's paramilitaries. "The Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia [the paramilitary umbrella organisation, or AUC] no longer exists," he said.
Others were less confident. Six weeks earlier, rumours that the paramilitaries were using the demobilisation process as a revolving door - in one end to get government benefits, out the other and back to business as usual - were confirmed by the chief OAS monitor of the demobilisations, Sergio Caramagna. He reported men wearing fatigues, carrying guns and radio communications equipment, acting in the same manner and using the same methods they used before. It was, he said, "a betrayal of the Colombian people's hopes for peace".
By June, police were reporting these "recycled" paramilitaries moving into the large cities, extorting, killing, recruiting, "disappearing" community leaders and taking over the underground economy.
June brought accusations from the chief prosecutor that the warlords had "hidden" their child soldiers. Unesco recorded that 1,500 children had gone missing.
Michael Jordan works with a German church group in a slum in the south of Bogota. The area is an end station for some of the three million displaced campesinos who lost their homes and their land when they fled the paramilitaries. On the walls of shack dwellings fresh graffiti messages read, "AUC PRESENTES" (AUC are here).
"Every day we see an increase in paramilitary activity," Jordan says. "They are massively recruiting youngsters. They pay the equivalent of $40 (€32) a month to children to become informers, and $150 to those who participate in so-called 'social cleansing operations' - or killing people.
"It's an occupation for unemployed, uneducated kids who have no prospects and no future . . . a way for them to make a bit of money, get a pretty girlfriend, be able to buy a CD player. In Colombia people don't kill for ideology. They kill for money and power," he said.
Recently, the paramilitaries have also targeted two universities. In Medellin, one professor has been killed and others have had to leave the country. In Bogota, threats against scientific staff and students have forced closure of the university's internationally recognised genetics institute. Sources link these attacks to its co-operation with government forensic anthropologists, excavating paramilitary massacre sites.
Meanwhile, investigators identifying the graves are discovering many have recently been emptied; the paramilitaries had been there first, disappearing their victims a second time.
And now, the political and legal battles over demobilisation and peace have moved to the courts and last week's crucial ruling.
Pushed through Congress by President Uribe 12 months ago, the law offered a sweetheart deal. In exchange for disarming their troops, the commanders were guaranteed greatly reduced sentences - five to eight years for mass murder, torture, disappearances and drug trafficking. They were not required to confess their atrocities, dismantle their criminal and drug networks, identify their financiers, turn over their fortunes for the reparation of their victims, or return their illegally seized lands - 16.8 million acres according to official figures.
The law also granted them political status, protecting them from extradition to the US.
With their vast wealth and political influence many had said the paramilitaries were relying on this law to legitimise and consolidate their power. Now the constitutional court's ruling sets conditions for lower sentences: the paramilitaries must make full, truthful confessions; pinpoint the bodies of those they "disappeared"; pay reparations to victims; if not, the authorities may refuse the lower sentences, embargo assets and seize illegally held land.
Last week the paramilitaries' initial response was to threaten to return to war. This week, after a visit from the interior minister and the peace commissioner, that changed. They spoke of the need for "national reconciliation", said they would "continue" working with "all those who love the patria". President Uribe championed the law which the court has now so drastically cut back, saying Colombia is not ready for the truth. For him, the court's ruling clearly presents problems. Nevertheless, government officials have said they will comply.
But Colombia is deeply divided over the paramilitary demobilisations. Peace and reconciliation have a long, long way to go.