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Death squads strikes again in South Bolivar region

Units from the Colombian army and allied right-wing death squads have encircled the village of Mico Ahumado en South Bolivar. The inhabitants are fleeing to save their lives from what they fear is a new massacre.

04.12.2002 (By Sembrar) According to information received from the Colombian rights group Sembrar, a new massacre is feared to be underway in South Bolivar region:

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The Public Services Coporation, Sembrar, denounces before national and international organisations the following events which are taking place in the district of MICO AHUMADO, Morales municipality, South of Bolivar.

On 1 December 2002, we received information that a group of approximately 400 armed men, identifying themselves as paramilitaries, was advancing towards the district of Moralito on the road which leads to the district of Mico Ahumado. It appears that the paramilitaries set up a check point in the village of La Arcadia.

Today, 2 December, inhabitants of the region are reporting that at 2:00pm they heard shots being fired and explosions near to the hamlet of Mico Ahumado. We have also been informed that there appear to have been some assassinations and there is some concern about a vehicle which left Mico Ahumado on Sunday 1 December heading towards the urban
centre of Morales because no one knows where it was going or the whereabouts of those inside the vehicle.

We have also been told that the inhabitants of Mico Ahumado have started a mass exodus to save their lives. Likewise we have been informed that, since 29 November 2002, in La Hamaca, in the municipality of Tiquisio, a group of armed men, identifying themselves as members of the army, has set up camp. In the municipality of Rio Viejo, in El Polvillo, Mina Brisa district, there is another group of armed men who are also identifying themselves as members of the army.

This kind of troop mobilisation, whether on the part of the army or the paramilitaries, appears designed to encircle the population of Mico Ahumado and nearby areas.

Today, 2 December, communications were sent to the commanders of the armed forces, asking them to take all the necessary steps to guarantee the lives, tranquility and integrity of the people of this region in the South of Bolivar.

(Translated by the Colombia Peace Association)

Eight campesinos hacked to death with axes

A paramilitary death squad attacked the village of El Choco in Antioquia and hacked eight victims to death with axes and machetes. The dead were so disfigured that some were impossible to identify.

03.12.2002 (By Elizabeth Atherton/Colombia Peace Association) In spite of a so-called pre-negotiation unilateral truce proposed by the right-wing AUC paramilitaries, who, according to human rights groups, are responsible, along with the Colombian armed forces, for more than 85 per cent of the human rights abuses committedin Colombia, Friday 29 November 2002 saw one of the worst massacres in recent weeks.

The massacre was carried out at the same time as the Colombian government announced to have advanced negotiations with the death squad umbrella organization AUC. The exact outcome of the negotiations are kept secret, but it is rumored that some kind of legalization of the death squads might be underway.

Most of the eight campesino victims, whose remains were only discovered two days later, were hacked to death with axes and machetes in the village of El Choco, San Carlos municipality, Antioquia, by members of the Metro Block of the Autodefensas Campesinas de Cordoba and Uraba (ACCU), a branch of the AUC.

The dead were so disfigured that some were impossible to identify. Those who have been named include: Luis Ramón Agudelo Aristizábal (38 years old); José Heriberto Arias Clavijo (37 years); María Doris Arias Clavijo (33 years); Jesús Emilio López Cadavid (62 years) y Héctor Emilio Soto Valencia (51 years).

At the time of writing, autopsies were being carried out on the remaining three victims who are thought to be a father and son, of 55 and 33 years respectively, and a young man of 22 years.

The paramilitaries arrived in the village of El Choco on Friday evening, took the targeted people from their homes and places of work and proceeded to kill them.