And that the violence that lives in the country is not repeated.
Victims of the Colombian armed conflict asked the State to give them justice and the Government to be heard this Sunday, as well as that the violence in which the country is immersed not be repeated.
During the commemoration of the National Day of Remembrance and Solidarity with the Victims, which is also the date of the assassination of the liberal leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán that was committed 75 years ago in Bogotá, people who have suffered from the conflict hoped to meet with the president Gustavo Petro to express his expectations.
However, the president was unable to attend the scheduled meeting in the capital and went online.
“We are here because there was the possibility that the president of the republic would listen to us, unfortunately he did not come,” Luz Marina Hache, spokesperson for the Movement of Victims of State Crimes (Movice), told EFE.
The meeting space was organized by the Unit for Victims at the Tequendama Hotel in Bogotá and was called “Among victims: life experiences and resistance to transform Colombia.”
According to the Government, a total of 9,423,138 people make up the universe of victims in Colombia.
Victims of the conflict in a virtual meeting with the President.
Victims of the conflict in a virtual meeting with the President.
EFE
Victims’ position
Hache wears a laminated portrait hanging from a purple thread around his neck and on it are printed a date -November 20, 1986, Bogotá- and a name -Eduardo Loffsner Torres-. He was his sentimental partner, a left-wing political militant, whom he has been looking for ever since.
«For us it is very important that we are heard and much more so the victims of State crimes. The State has always hidden behind the fact that it is a victim and has never assumed its responsibility in the acts of violence that this country has experienced, “he says.
In his opinion, not all victims are the same, because there are those who have suffered on behalf of illegal armed groups, and that is why he believes that the State “must assume its responsibility in this social and armed conflict that Colombia has experienced.”
«We bet on peace, we always have, but a peace with social justice, with truth, with memory and with guarantees of non-repetition. However, the acts of violence continue to occur, the murders of social leaders continue, “he adds.
Nelson Moreno, meanwhile, is a retired soldier who survived an antipersonnel mine on November 20, 2011 in the municipality of La Uribe, in the department of Meta (center).
This soldier believes that the peace agreement signed with the FARC in November 2016, instead of having the victims at the center, as planned, has “the perpetrators there, since they enjoy impunity and many privileges on the day from today”.
“Today we call on the president of the republic to reform justice in this country, so that history does not repeat itself,” he told EFE, adding that “many victims today die hoping to have justice.” .
Victims of the conflict in a virtual meeting with the President.
Victims of the conflict in a virtual meeting with the President.
EFE
Government position
President Petro attended the event electronically and invited the victims to become a great social movement for peace.
“The victims in Colombia number in the millions. If those millions of people could organize themselves, we could have the first social movement in Colombia whose objective is to achieve peace. It seems fundamental to me that the organizations of victims, of all kinds, of any origin, become a Social Movement for Peace,” said the president.
Meanwhile, the director of the Unit for Victims, Patricia Tobón, said that this Sunday’s space was “for reflection, construction and hard truths as well.”
“We are a fragmented, polarized, deeply stigmatized, broken, stratified country. And we have to transform it between all of us. We need the experience and the voice of the victims, of those who work for peace”, he pointed out.
EFE