The government does not have the capacity to immediately compensate all 6 million victims of Colombia’s ongoing armed conflict, President Juan Manual Santos told local media on Wednesday.
Santos told Radio Señal Colombia that while he still needed to improve several aspects of the Victims and Land Restitution law’s implementation, in recent years the administration has made a “monumental institutional and financial effort”, and spent at least $1.1 billion to compensate over 350,000 victims of the conflict.
“We have warned all all the enemies of the land restitution process. We will not allow these violent offenders or who do not want the lands restored to the farmers when there is a legitimate claim. They will face the full weight of the authorities and the law,” said President Santos.
The Victims and Land Restitution Law was passed by President Santos in June 2011 with the hope it would deliver some sense of justice to those affected by the nearly 50-year armed conflict.
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Santos reminded the public that last week he proposed a bill to streamline the land restitution process, making it easier for victims of forced displacement to file land restitution requests.
On Wednesday morning the full Congress welcomed over 500 delegates from the victims of armed conflict as a symbolic act of redress to their plight.
According to the UNHCR, March 2013 figures revealed that 4.7 million people were internally displaced within Colombia, including 150,000 in 2012 alone.