The human rights situation for children in Colombia is the worst in Latin America, the president of the the International Tribunal for Children affected by War and Poverty said Tuesday.
According to an article published by Humania, Sergio Tapia invited the international community to denounce human rights violations against Colombian children and to try the country’s illegal armed groups for genocide and crimes against the youth of Colombia.
“The violence against children in Colombia is very high, the armed groups work with them and the social conflict deepens; the idea of violence as a way of life to earn easy money is strengthened. You see a six-year-old that works as an intelligence agent in the neighborhoods or who transports arms. Added to the rearmament of paramilitary groups that recruit young people, they [paramilitaries] are responsible for more than 3,000 deaths of Colombian children and minors, they should be taken before the International Court and also hold processes of truth and justice before the Colombian society. My mission as international human rights attorney is [that] if I can’t stop these crimes, to at least denounce them, so they are not accepted in silence,” said Tapia.
Colombian children continue to suffer grave human rights violations in the armed conflict including disappearances, forced recruitment, imprisonment, massacres, homcides and torture.