CASE N° CO/121 - PIEDAD CÓRDOBA - COLOMBIA

Resolution adopted without a vote by the Inter-Parliamentary Council
at its 168th session (Havana, 7 April 2001)

The Inter-Parliamentary Council,

Having before it the case of Ms. Piedad Córdoba of Colombia, which has been the subject of a study and report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians in accordance with the "Procedure for the examination and treatment, by the Inter-Parliamentary Union, of communications concerning violations of human rights of parliamentarians",

Taking note of the report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians (CL/168/13(c)-R.1), which contains a detailed outline of the case,

Taking account of the information supplied by Ms. Piedad Córdoba on the occasion of the 105th Conference of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (April 2001),

Considering that Ms. Córdoba, as President of the Senate Human Rights Committee, has been at the forefront of denouncing human rights and humanitarian law abuses,

Considering the following information on file:

• Ms. Córdoba was kidnapped on 21 May 1999 by a group of 15 heavily armed men claiming to be members of the Attorney General's Office; that Carlos Castaño, head of the paramilitary "Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia" (AUC), subsequently admitted that his group was responsible for the kidnapping, which he justified with the assertion that Senator Córdoba was a "paraguerrillera"; Ms. Córdoba was released on 4 June 1999 and handed over, in the presence of Carlos Castaño, to a commission made up of Senate members, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Attorney General's Office; while in the hands of the paramilitary, she was taken from place to place by government helicopters;
• Upon her release, her telephone conversations were tapped and transcripts thereof published in the media, jeopardising her personal safety; the Attorney General has launched investigations in this respect;
• On 9 September 1999 Ms. Córdoba reported to the media the existence of a plan to kill her, asserting that those behind the plan were the same extreme right-wing military who, on 13 August 1999, had assassinated Jaime Garzón, a nationally known satirist and journalist and member of the commission which was to attempt to restore contact between the ELN guerrillas and the Government;
• At a press conference on 6 October 1999, Ms. Córdoba announced that, with the looming threat of an attack on her life and given the lack of effective security measures and the absence of any political resolve on the part of the Government and Congress to guarantee the rights of the opposition, she and her family had to go into exile; Ms. Córdoba has been granted political asylum abroad,

Noting that, according to information supplied by the Human Rights Office of the Vice-Presidency of the Republic on 4 July 2000, the investigation into Ms. Córdoba's kidnapping, registered under N° 521, was being conducted by the Human Rights Unit of the Attorney General's Office; there existed public information to the effect that Carlos Castaño claimed responsibility for the kidnapping and "it is hoped that the Senator will complete her declaration and adduce new evidence enabling the investigating authorities to make progress",

Bearing in mind that Colombia is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and to the American Convention on Human Rights, both of which guarantee the right to security of person,

Noting that the 2001 report on Colombia of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights pointed out that "Carlos Castaño Gil had gained public visibility in the national and international media with disconcerting ease and that while paramilitary operations were still on the rise, they had not encountered any governmental action aimed at stopping them; that, by contrast with the large military offensives against the guerrillas, deploying huge human and logistic resources in campaigns that last for weeks, the results of the Government's anti-paramilitary policy … were patchy",

1. Expresses deep concern at Ms. Córdoba's kidnapping and the death threats which forced her into exile;

2. Emphasises that the State is under an obligation to ensure the security of the persons under its jurisdiction, both directly by means of reasonable and appropriate measures to protect them and indirectly through the identification and punishment of those who threaten their security;

3. Is alarmed that no action has been taken against Carlos Castaño although it is public knowledge that he was responsible for the kidnapping and has so identified himself; urges the authorities to taken action forthwith as their duty commands;

4. Recalls that, in its third report on the human rights situation in Colombia (February 1999), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights concluded that "the State has played an important role in the development of the paramilitary groups and has not adequately combated those groups. The State is thus responsible, in a global sense, for the existence of the paramilitary and therefore faces responsibility for the actions carried out by those groups";

5. Wishes to ascertain whether investigations have been launched to identify and bring to justice the authors of the plan to kill Ms. Córdoba, and their result, if any; also wishes to ascertain the result, if any, of the investigation into the tapping of her telephone conversations;

6. Requests the Secretary General to convey this resolution to the competent authorities, urging them to provide the requested information;

7. Requests the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians to continue examining this case and report to it at its next session (September 2001).

Note: you can download a complete electronic version of the brochure "Results of the 105th Conference and related meetings of the Inter-Parliamentary Union" in PDF format (file size approximately 442K). This version requires Adobe Acrobat Reader, which you can download free of charge.