President Gustavo Petro and Attorney General Francisco Barbosa met again to talk about the submission Law project that seeks to dismantle the country’s criminal gangs. A key point in the Total Peace policy to which the head of the investigative entity has formulated several criticisms.
This project is the missing piece to consolidate the rapprochement between the Government and groups such as the Clan del Golfo or the Conquistadores Self-Defense Forces of the Sierra Nevada, as well as the high-impact structures of cities such as Medellín, Quibdó, Cali, among others.
The project establishes the conditions and benefits under which the members of these organizations, without political recognition, can pay their sentences in exchange for renouncing violence. With this law, which has already been presented to Congress, one more boost could be given to the rapprochement maintained by the Office of the High Commissioner for Peace.
Barbosa met with his work team over the weekend, according to what the media could establish, to analyze the text presented by the Government. After that reading, the head of the accusing entity concluded several concerns that he will raise directly with President Petro.
The attorney general would be concerned about the role of the Prosecutor’s Office in the Law. For example, according to the magazine Semana, the regulation contemplates removing that function and leaving it in charge of the Investigation Unit of the Prosecutor’s Office, which is chosen by the Special Jurisdiction for Peace.
The same prosecutor has opposed suspending arrest warrants against people requested in extradition from gangs without political recognition, that is, drug traffickers. He even refused to grant 16 of those requests from members of the Clan del Golfo and the Self-Defense Forces of the Sierra to advance the rapprochement with the Government.
In this sense, Barbosa would also ask for clarification on the differentiation of the sentences, since the project contemplates sentences between 6 and 8 years regardless of the crimes, for those who submit to justice and commit to the restorative and reparation actions that are contemplated. . According to Danilo Rueda, Peace Commissioner, they were based on the Justice and Peace law implemented by the government of Álvaro Uribe, he told El Tiempo.
The attorney general has also expressed his concern about possible ceasefires with drug trafficking groups, which was one of the objections to Total Peace that he raised from Washington, where he compared it to having ceased actions in the 1980s against Pablo Escobar or the Cali sign.
Barbosa seeks not to establish political agreements with criminal groups, that is to say, to leave clearly defined which groups will be recognized as rebel actors and which criminals, who should have different treatment.
High Commissioner Rueda told the Congressional Peace Commission that a project is being sought “as consensual as possible, which of course happens in discussion with the Attorney General of the Nation and those responsible for the State’s criminal policy.”
“If we manage to get around some issues related to the autonomy of powers, with the exercise that the attorney general of the nation has been carrying out, being very rigorous in understanding what we are talking about when we are talking about peace, we could say that we have reached an dialogical scenario that allows us to advance in the scenarios of verifiable commitments of the progress of exits, very concrete, in the legal and political spheres that allow the simultaneous transition of various groups to the rule of law,” said the commissioner.
He assured that with the current penal system, the approval of the congressional project, it will be possible to advance in results that would be visible at the end of 2024 with the demobilization of various structures that are currently in the rapprochement phase.
Part of these phases of the last six months have focused on agreements such as suspending torture, disappearances, murders and avoiding confrontations with armed actors in dispute and with the public force, as well as reducing the effects on the environment, by the structures.
Rueda pointed out that the beginning of the rapprochements is based on building trust, due to the events that occurred in past rapprochements. But they are close to establishing dialogue phases in several territories, such as Medellín, where 12 armed groups have already expressed their willingness to advance to that phase.
The high commissioner pointed out that, for example, the Clan del Golfo had around 2,500 men in 2018, when it expressed its desire to demobilize in the government of Juan Manuel Santos, and currently has between 6,000 and 12,000 men, according to figures from the Office. de Rueda and the declarations of the same armed group.
“We return to the old formulas of always, how we take this country forward. Or we let that continue to grow, dominating in the midst of our formality of the State of law. They can grow because they have a lot of resources,” warned the Commissioner. with Infobae