The International Labour Organisation (ILO) said Thursday violence against Colombia’s worker’s union members has decreased “significantly” in recent years.
“We have increased measures to fight violence against trade unionists and if we compare information from the past ten years we observe a significant reduction,” said the ILO chairwoman Cleopatra Doumbia-Henry at a seminar attended by representatives from Colombia’s Interior Ministry.
“More resources have been assigned, more people are working with this goal and more effective measures are on the way,” the ILO official said.
Nevertheless, Doumbia-Henry said violence against Colombian unionists “still exists” and “we need zero tolerance for this plague.”
The ILO chairwoman said the creation of the National Unity of Protection, a Colombian government organization dedicated to workers rights, represented an important step towards the improvement of the security of labor rights workers.
According to a report released in early June by the International Trade Union Confederation, Colombia is the most dangerous country in the world for unionist workers. The document shows that in 2011 at least 29 union workers were killed in Colombia on account of their union work.