Demonstrators in Colombia point fingers at police for sexual violence

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The marches in Colombia, which continue after more than two weeks, are crying out today against sexual violence against demonstrators by security forces, after up to 16 cases were reported during these days of mass protests.

“If this is how pretty all the demonstrators are, you feel like gassing them all”, denounced a woman who a police officer told during one of the marches during these days.

In addition, yesterday, the case of the death of a minor, allegedly by suicide, was reported after she denounced touching and sexual abuse in a police station in the city of Popayán, Cauca (southwest).

With banners of “Police, don’t rape me” or “Women are not spoils of war.” With shouts against patriarchy or abuses committed by the security forces, two hundred people gathered today in one of the protests called, in front of the Immediate Attention Command (CAI), a police station neighborhood of La Soledad, in Bogotá.

“We women are holding a sit-in to reject once again – because it is not the first time – that the security forces, the police, and the Esmad (Mobile Anti-Riot Squad) rape women, detain them, torture them,” said María Eugenia Ramírez, a feminist and activist with Mujeres por la Paz, at the protest.

ACCUSATIONS OF TOUCHING

The woman came out in support of the minor from Popayán, who denounced on her social networks that several police officers grabbed her when recording a video at a protest.

“They pulled down my pants and groped me,” expressed the minor.

The minor’s grandmother denounced that when she returned from the Immediate Reaction Unit (URI) where she was taken, she returned with bruises on her body and told her that she had been groped. The minor was found unconscious in her home on Thursday, allegedly after committing suicide, and was taken to a hospital, where she could not be resuscitated.

The Police defended itself this Thursday, saying that the facts were not true since the young girl was not in police custody because they detected that she was a minor and was returned to her grandmother in perfect condition, as alleged by the commander of the institution in Popayán, General Ricardo Alarcón.

RAPE AS A WEAPON OF WAR

The NGO Temblores, which is closely following the police abuses committed since April 28 in the protests throughout the country, denounced, in addition to 39 homicides and 2,110 acts of violence, 16 cases of sexual violence, and 3 of gender violence.

“We know that we are having an underreporting simply because we cannot reach all the information and because not all the violated people denounce”, explained today the researcher of this NGO, Emilia Marquez.

“Something particular to the protests of these days, which is very important to mention, is that sexual violence is often linked to types of violence that can even be classified as torture,” said Marquez.

Diana Fernanda Díaz was the victim of “a carnal and violent act by Esmad police officers”, as she denounced on her social networks.

On April 30, at a demonstration in Cali (southwest), the epicenter of the protests, when the police dispersed ten people with gas and stun guns separating the women.

“At that moment, one of the Esmad approached me and abused me, in the presence of all his companions, including a woman, to whom I expressed my discontent,” the young woman explained at the time. The Police again denied the facts.

“This is not a practice that the police have just invented in these demonstrations, but it is a type of violence that has been happening in war contexts for a very long time,” the Temblores researcher emphasized.

DWINDLING PROTESTS

The protests, which began last April 28 against the now extinct tax reform and have claimed 42 fatalities (41 civilians and one policeman), as reported to the Ombudsman’s Office, have resulted in a myriad of petitions that could be summarized in the discontent for the neoliberal policies of the Government and the police brutality with which the security forces have acted.

The Government tries to ask the National Unemployment Committee, which called for the first protests, to sit at the negotiating table to tackle one of the worst social and political crises in the country’s history, but still fails to firmly condemn the abuses committed by the security forces during the protests.

“Sixty-five disciplinary actions have been taken, 27 for abuse of authority, 11 for physical aggression, 8 for homicide, 19 for other conduct,” Duque said during his visit to Cali last Tuesday, where he also announced that they had detained 667 people “for vandalism.”

Although some saw these disciplinary actions against the security forces as a step in favor of the international community that has denounced the atrocities against the demonstrators, Temblores, which yesterday took the government to the International Criminal Court for these events, believes that the judicial actions are completely unbalanced.

The NGO warns that many more civilians have been arrested for peacefully demonstrating than police for their actions.

Civilians have been persecuted without any evidence and presumption of innocence,” said Temblores, “but when we see the acts of sexual violence that occur in the protests by the police, the presumption of innocence is at its highest level.