Bogotá, September 7, 2020 - From early morning hours, nearly 30 people have decided to set up a humanitarian camp in front of one of the headquarters of the International Red Cross in Bogotá, seeking for this organization to establish official channels of communication with the national government to face the humanitarian crisis that the country is experiencing, so that immediate measures can be taken to stop the assassination of social leaders, dismantle paramilitarism and definitively stop the massacres.
According to Indepaz, in 2020 alone there have been more than 50 massacres in Colombia and the assassination of more than 573 social leaders since the possession of Iván Duque, facts that are mainly concentrated where the presence of paramilitary gangs and drug traffickers persists. The organizations concentrated in the northern neighborhood of the city, denounce that the government does not offer any type of solution to this humanitarian drama, and on the contrary insists on military measures and the return of glyphosate fumigation as the only solution to a problem that has been growing during its mandate.
That is why different social organizations have decided to install the so-called "Humanitarian Camp for Life" in front of the International Red Cross. They demand, among other things, the fulfillment of existing dispositions in the legal system, the implementation of programs and the functioning of mechanisms tending to offer democratic guarantees and peace in the territories.
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From the "Humanitarian Camp for Life" they call on the new leader of the International Red Cross in Colombia, Mulan Giovannini, to hold an urgent meeting with social organizations so that she can attend to the list of demands and enable a direct dialogue with the high government. They affirm that they will not withdraw from the site until they are able to obtain some response from the international organization, and for this reason they are calling for a great vigil for life for today, Monday, September 7, in front of their headquarters at the national and international level starting at 6pm.