WASHINGTON (AlertNet) – Colombia has scant hope of ending its four-decade-old war as long as key players in the conflict remain committed to military spending rather than peaceful solutions, a prominent Colombian rights activist said.
Jorge Rojas Rodriguez, founder of a group devoted to promoting human rights and helping people displaced by the fighting, made his remarks on May 17 as he accepted a humanitarian award from the biggest alliance of U.S.-based aid groups for his work advocating peaceful and democratic alternatives to the conflict.
“We have a guerrilla movement that has been frozen in time in the 1960s, a national security doctrine that has not emerged from the 1970s and a United States military aid model that harks back to the 1980s,” he told members of InterAction, which represents 160 groups doing international relief work.
“It would appear that all of these key actors are looking backward and that in looking backward they are closing off the possibility of the future.”
The United Nations has called Colombia’s conflict between the government and far-right paramilitaries the worst humanitarian crisis in the Western hemisphere, with more than two million driven from their homes by the fighting.
Human rights activists are frequently harassed and killed in Colombia.
Jorge Rojas said the government was spending $7.3 million a day on the war but almost nothing to help an average of 730 people forced off their land each day.
Meanwhile, he said the Bush administration was providing $1.7 million a day to help the Colombian government continue the war, while paramilitary groups were spending $2.6 million daily.
“I’m sad to tell you that all of the armed actors in Colombia are looking toward more war and are not looking seriously for peace,” he said.
InterAction said its annual humanitarian award was intended to honour Jorge Rojas’ long dedication to the defence of human rights in Colombia, both as a journalist and founder in 1992 of Human Rights and Displacement Consultancy, known by the Spanish acronym of CODHES.
InterAction also honoured New York Times journalist Carlotta Gall for her humanitarian reporting from Afghanistan and ZUMA Press photographer Jeffrey Austin for his work capturing effective humanitarian assistance.
A delegate from Colombia sleeps during a break in an all-night plenary meeting at the UN Climate Change Conference 2009 in Copenhagen December 19, 2009. REUTERS/Bob Strong (DENMARK - Tags: ENVIRONMENT ...
