Fourteen years have passed since the massacre in Colombia, which was later known as “False Positives”, an event in which 19 young people from the municipality of Soacha and Bogotá disappeared without a trace.
Extrajudicial executions, popularly known as “false positives”, are murders of civilians by state agents who are presented as members of illegal armed groups to show military results.
This fact is still a wound in Colombian society and a reprehensible fact in the public forces, in particular the Army, because they did the opposite of what their profession demands of them, which is to protect citizens and that they must respect the constitution, the laws and International Humanitarian Law.
Although the event dates back to 2008, for two years, with the aim of promoting actions for the recognition and dignity of the victims and the construction of a broad narrativethe Truth Commission began working on this case together with the Mothers of the False Positives of Soacha (MAFAPO), an organization created in 2010.
Victims’ cases are handled independently, so there are still open cases so far. In this way, this May 10, with the participation of 13 victims and members of MAFAPO, the Truth Commission will carry out in Soacha the ‘Meeting for the Truth: Recognition of responsibilities in the Colombian country.
WHAT HAPPENED IN SOACHA AND BOGOTA?
According to the National Center for Historical Memory of Colombia, between January and August 2008, 19 young people from the municipality of Soacha and Bogotá disappeared without a trace. These guys didn’t know each other and neither did their families.
After months of searching, their loved ones received the news that the lifeless bodies of the young people were found in cemeteries and mass graves in Ocaña and Cimitarra, Norte de Santander. And not only that. They had been presented as guerrillas killed in combat with the 15th Brigade of the National Army.
Then it became known that since 2005, the Ministry of Defense was applying a directive (signed by Camilo Ospina BernalMinister of Defense in the government of then President Álvaro Uribe Vélez), which granted rewards to the military for each capture or death of a leader of organizations outside the law.
The cases of the disappeared youths in Soacha and Bogotá presented similar characteristics. For the most part, they were boys who came from poor or peasant families with deep needs.who were looking for job opportunities to get ahead and support their family nucleus.
Since then, and despite the constant threats they have had to face, the mothers of Soacha began to gather in public squares, universities and schools, to denounce the disappearance and murder of their children, and to demand that the truth be told and Justice is done in the face of these crimes committed by the Armed Forces.
In addition, they created the Suacha and Bogotá False Positive Mothers (MAFAPO) foundation. For them, naming their territory as Suacha, and not Soacha, is part of the identity they gave themselves and the foundation.
THE STORY OF THE TRUTH
Since 2019, the Truth Commission has spoken with those responsible for these crimes in three private dialogues and at least 18 preparatory meetings, thanks to the complaints from MAFAPO, and others that became known after these first events that occurred in 2008.
The Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) has found concrete evidence of 6,402 cases of extrajudicial executions in 31 of the 32 departments of Colombia.
In this new meeting with the MAFAPOthe Truth Commission considers that this is the time to recognize individual and collective responsibilities, to try to dignify those who were stigmatized, the mothers and relatives who toured the country and those who initially did not believe them about the disappearance of their beloved.
The recognition processes of the Commission seek to understand the impacts of the conflict on personal, family and community dynamics, allowing a collective reflection on the experience of the internal armed conflict and its victims. This is why during the Encounter for the Truth there will also be recognition of those responsibleincluding three state agents.
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