The letter explains that for the success of his entire peace policy, certain security strategies must be adhered to, guaranteeing the human rights of citizens, dismantling the armed groups and the illegal economic systems that sustain them.
In the letter, HRW’s new Americas director, Juanita Goebertus, first says that the current president’s proposal, “if properly designed and implemented”,
it has sufficient potential to make progress in protecting the human rights of communities abused by sectors of armed conflict.
The organization makes a total of five recommendations to the government:
First and foremost, it asks you to guarantee the implementation of “a policy to restore territorial security”, as this is urgent and necessary given that former President Duque’s government has failed to guarantee human rights in remote areas and allowed the expansion of illegal groups .
In the second point, he asks Petro to define with which criminal groups he intends to negotiate and how the approaches will be carried out, since there are more than 30 armed organizations in the country and many of them have links to drug trafficking, illegal mining and other activities illegal.
The third point HRW emphasizes concerns the causes spreading the violence in the country, which have contributed to new armed groups after their predecessors were demobilized.
HRW recognizes peace processes like the one with the ELN, but asks the President that these new plans do not repeat what was agreed in the process with the FARC and that their implementation should be stepped up.
They welcome Petro’s so-called “War on Drugs,” but call on him “to develop alternative approaches to drug policy at the regional level in the medium term that are based on international human rights standards.”
In four points, he states that his government “must guarantee that all agreements meet the duty to identify, prosecute and punish those responsible for serious abuses and include appropriate conditions for the perpetrators, such as full truth and reparation for the victims to receive reduced sentences.”
Finally, HRW calls on the government to take special measures to prevent fraudulent demobilization of people who are not part of the groups but want to take advantage of the agreements.