Posted by Rob Grace on November 04, 2011  |   Comment  |   Subscribe

This week, the International Crisis Group (ICG) released a report examining the effect of Colombia’s armed conflict on the country’s unstable border regions.  As the report notes:

For fifteen years, porous borders that offer strategic advantages to illegal armed groups and facilitate extensive illicit economies have exposed them to an intense armed conflict that is made worse by the widespread absence of public institutions. The warfare triggered a humanitarian emergency and worsened relations especially with Ecuador and Venezuela, the most affected neighbours.

The report asserts that despite some recent policies implemented by Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos — aimed at improving relations with Ecuador and Venezuela and increasing economic and social development in border regions — the Colombian government “must pay more attention to the humanitarian challenges and boost measures to build civilian state capacity in its border zones.”  At the same time, Ecuador and Venezuela “need to do more to tackle drug trafficking and organised crime and to comply better with international obligations to protect refugees.” 

The report also highlights the prevalence of sexual violence in the armed conflict.  On the Ecuadorian border, “[v]iolence against women is rampant” and “[a]rmed actors, including the military, regularly abuse them sexually.”  On the Venezuelan border, “sexual abuse of girls is common, by both illegal groups and members of the security forces.”  An Amnesty International report released in September provides further in-depth documentation and analysis of sexual violence in Colombia, as does the 2009 United Nations Secretary-General’s 1612 Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism report.

ICG also calls on all parties of the conflict to abide by international humanitarian law (IHL), arguing that “[t]he legitimacy of [Colombian] security force action has suffered from human rights and IHL violations by the military and police,” and “[i]f troops do not respect such rules, improving relations with the local population and jointly constructing functioning local governance will remain uphill battles.” A recent analysis concerning the new operational law of the Colombian armed forces and its relationship with IHL and human rights law is available in Constantin von der Groeben’s article published earlier this year in the Journal of Conflict and Security Law.

Ultimately, ICG concludes that an assertive strategy geared toward stabilizing and developing Colombia’s border regions might be the key to ending the armed conflict:

Colombia will not see an end to violence without negotiating a settlement with the guerrillas. Given the importance of the border region to wider conflict dynamics, laying the foundations for sustainable development there is the best bet to set the stage for such negotiations and thus lasting peace.

Read the full report here.