In these places of reclusion a serious
humanitarian situation exists. Prisoners who die through lack of medical
attention or from infections that spread due to overcrowding, are just
the tip of the iceberg. Those who are imprisoned for political reasons
claim to have been given powdered glass in their food or to have been
thrown out of windows.-
-
Miriam Valero
-
In Colombian prisons the words
Human Rights appear to have
no meaning. A prisoner leaves behind his dignity and probably also his
health, when he crosses the frontier between his previous life and his
future sentence behind bars in one of the country’s prisons.
Both the prisoners and the United Nations have exposed the conditions
in which they live: overcrowding, the spread of infections, denial of
medical treatment, violence and limited access to water, among other
abuses. Mistreatment that sometimes ends with the death or suicide of
some of them. For those who are imprisoned for political reasons related
to the Colombian conflict, the situation is worse. Cases have been
reported of them being given food containing powdered glass, as well as
prisoners who have been denied medical assistance after being captured
during combat.
All these facts – which have led the prisoners to organize a protest – were described to
The Prisma from Bogotá by Uldarico Flórez Peña, a human rights defence lawyer and president of the
Fundación Brigada Jurídica Eduardo Umaña Mendoza (FBJEUM), an institution which defends the rights of prisoners.
What is the situation for prisoners in Colombia?
It is very serious. In the debate which took place in the Congress of
the Republic on this subject, it was shown that the problem of
overcrowding in prisons is at quite a high level. A situation which
leads to a systematic weakening of the rights of people who have been
deprived of their freedomn, and through which the Colombian state is not
meeting its treaty obligations, human rights conventions or what in our
country is known as the Bloque de Constitutionalidad (a set of
supranational legal principles that exist in various countries of Latin
America.
They are not part of the Constitution but are used to guide the formulation of internal laws).
What are the reasons for overcrowding?
Historically the problem of prisons in Colombia is that there is no
official policy to deal with the problem of overcrowding. The
legislative apparatus is increasing prison terms more and more, and
creating new offences. This means that the prisons are overflowing. If
they are built , let’s say for 100, 200 or 300 people, we find there are
3,000 or 4,000. In fact, the trade unions of the Instituto
Penitenciario y Carcelario (INPEC), who also suffer from this situation,
had to organize a protest to demand that no more prisoners be sent, as
adequate conditons do not exist to house them.
The prisoners live in degrading conditions. The Colombian
Constitutional Court, in a landmark decision, ruled that the conditions
in Colombian prisons are unconstitutional, and gave the state a limited
period in which to solve the problem. Over 10 years later nothing has
been done.
The lack of medical attention has also been exposed
This is another critical problem. In the most important prisons like
La Picota, La Modelo or Valledupar, there isn’t even a doctor to attend
to the medical problems of the inmates. Many of the prisoners who were
captured during fighting are not given medical care, which infringes
their universal human rights. People with infectious or contagious
illnesses live in close proximity with other prisoners and are not given
the specialized treatment they require.
There are no medicines or basic first aid. During the protest three
prisoners died in La Picota due to incompetence, negligence and lack of
due care by INPEC.
As part of the national protest some of the prisoners are on hunger strike, how are they after 10 days without taking food?
This form of protest is a refusal to accept food supplied by INPEC
because in Valledupar they gave them food containing powdered glass,
with the criminal intention of eliminating a number of political
prisoners. These prisoners are afraid that the food they are given could
be a threat to their lives. But the hunger strike is not permanent, it
happens at intervals in each of the prisons in turn.
How is the protest going? Have any incidents been recorded?
Yes.
Last week in the prison in Cómbita (Boyacá), members of INPEC arrived
and attacked the Human Rights Committee and the protest organizers. It
was from this prison that what is now known as the National Prisoners
Movement was formed.
How were they attacked, exactly?
One of the elite prison guard units went into the prision, and
without any discussion and in contravention of right to peaceful protest
under the National Constitution, they injured several inmates and
protest leaders. They were taken away on stretchers, and we have no
information about where they are.
The
FBJEUM has already made a complaint to the Inter-American Human Rights
Commission, the World Organization against Torture, the Public
Prosecutor and the Defender of Public Rights, as well as to the director
of INPEC.
What is very striking is that not even 10 days have passed since the
debate in the Congress of the Republic on the prison situation, and the
INPEC Guard have already violently attacked the organisers of the
protest. The same has been happening in other prisons.
Who has the complaint been made against?
The charge is against the INPEC Guard who have been beating and
torturing people in prisons without any explanation. Those who attacked
the prison in Cómbita are a specialist squad within the INPEC called the
GRIL. They made this violent attack precisely because people have
limited rights and freedoms and only have their voices to protest with.
What are the demands the prisoners are fighting for?
The movement has spread to almost all the prisons in the country.
They have put a series of demands, including a 20% reduction in
sentences for all prisoners, the right to family visits, no extradition,
as well as a reform of the code of prisons and penitentiaries. The
movement is extensive because they have put forward other proposals,
such as an amnesty for all political prisoners, who are presently
serving 40 or 50 year sentences. This demand is due to the fact that the
government never at any time wanted to accept one-for-one prisoner
exchanges, which were provided for in international human rights law,
and also because the insurgent groups have freed every one of the people
they were holding for political reasons.
