Human Rights (Colombia)

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Westminster Hall

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North (Jim Sheridan) on securing the debate. The number of Members wanting to speak, intervene and listen shows the strength of feeling about the issue. The debate is very timely, coinciding as it does with President Santos’s visit.

My hon. Friend provided us, as did a number of other speakers, with compelling accounts of human rights abuses in Colombia, in particular concerns about comrades in the Colombian trade union movement. He said that Colombia is the most dangerous place in the world to be a trade unionist, with 2,908 of them killed since 1986 and 23 so far this year. He expressed his deep concern about impunity, about the lack of prosecution of those responsible for the killings. He also expressed some scepticism about whether the warm words and rhetoric of President Santos, who was elected last year, would be matched by action, and about the how the land and victims law will work in practice. I shall come to that.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) talked about the EU free trade agreement, and he is right that it should not be just about trade. When we enter into such negotiations, it is important to use the leverage that they give us to put human rights issues on the table as well. He said that foreign policy should not just be about selling more to foreigners, and I entirely agree.

My hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) raised the important issue of the impact of the drugs trade and consumption in the west on communities in Colombia and Mexico. He said that the UK, the US and Spain are the largest consumers of cocaine. It is said that a line of coke snorted here results in a death back in Colombia—a compelling image. When President Santos addressed the all-party British-Latin America group yesterday, he was asked about that and he said that it is not just the link between cocaine consumption here and the violence in Colombia but the really serious issue of deforestation and land grabbing. We ought to factor in the significant environmental impact of consuming cocaine in the west.

We of course welcome President Santos on his visit to the UK. It is a very important opportunity for dialogue, not just on human rights but on other issues of great importance to the relationship between our nations, such as trade, the environment and working together on technology transfer. Yesterday, the President was particularly keen to flag up education, and whether Colombia can learn from and adapt our approach to training and skills in the UK, which is somewhat ironic given that the trade union movement has been so involved in pushing that agenda here. As today’s debate has shown however, the human rights situation in Colombia continues to be our gravest concern. I appreciate the President’s willingness to address that issue in a full and frank manner with the all-party group yesterday, and also at the meeting I attended with the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Foreign Secretary straight afterwards, when we discussed in depth concerns about the continued violence in Colombia and impunity, in particular attacks on human rights defenders and trade unionists.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

I am sorry that I missed the early part of the debate; I was in a Select Committee. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a collective failure by the European Union, the International Labour Organisation and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights that none of the human rights elements in the trade and other international agreements that Colombia has signed up to has been enforced at local level, and that therefore the disappearances of very brave human rights defenders and the abuse of their human rights continue?

[Kerry McCarthy]

I agree that past attempts to put pressure on Colombian Governments have not been effective. Impunity, at 98% or thereabouts, is a shocking statistic. It is important, and I will ask the Minister about this in a moment, that we use any leverage we have, anything within our power, to try to push that agenda along to ensure that it is not just warm words about human rights but that action is taken on the ground to protect them. President Santos was prepared to meet the non-governmental organisations today. I was not aware yesterday that trade unions would be involved in that meeting, and it is very important that they were. Anything the Minister can do to ensure better dialogue between the people from the trade union movement who have visited Colombia and the Colombian regime is an important step forward.

Anyone who has met human rights campaigners from Colombia cannot fail to be moved by their stories. A week or two ago I met some women who were talking about the shocking rise in gender-based violence and the use of rape in the conflict. President Santos was not able to explain why there has been such a dramatic increase over the past year or two, and the assessments that have been made seem to indicate that the violence is being carried out by the guerrilla movement, paramilitaries in particular, and the security forces, and that women are being targeted across the board. I hope that issue is very much on the Minister’s radar.

[Eric Joyce (Falkirk) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we tend to conflate the issues of drugs and human rights in Colombia but that human rights problems existed long before the country was effectively the centre of the world as far as cocaine production was concerned? Any solution, therefore, must not simply involve killing the likes of Alfonso Cano but have social justice at its core.

[Kerry McCarthy]

I agree. It is a complex situation, involving drug wars, the political situation, the role of FARC, the land grab and commercial interests. I am not suggesting that there is one solution. It is an incredibly complex situation to unravel, but President Santos’s rhetoric is very welcome. Recently, there has been significant progress in tackling some of the violence that has plagued the country over the past 50 years. FARC’s activities have been curtailed, but there is genuine concern that a more fragmented organisation is less likely to come to the negotiating table.

Does the Minister see a particular role for the UK? It has been flagged up a number of times that given our history of negotiating with groups, particularly in Northern Ireland, and given the recent decision by ETA, there might be lessons to be learnt that could help the Colombian Government in their discussions with FARC. President Santos has indicated that he is very willing to pursue such negotiations.

President Santos’s announcement in the past month about disbanding DAS, the administrative department of security, is a very welcome step given the allegations of collusion with paramilitaries, illegal surveillance, corruption and harassment of judges, journalists and politicians. The president has said:

“The country knows why we have decided to take this step,”

and that is, I think, both a tacit admission that the allegations against DAS were well founded, and an important signal that the President wants to restore the integrity of his country’s intelligence services.

Nevertheless, there are understandably still concerns about the human rights situation. In the first year of the Santos Administration 54 human rights defenders were killed, there has been a significant increase in gender-based violence, and there are concerns about the future of indigenous peoples—campesinos and Afro-Colombians—who have been displaced from their land to make way for drug and palm oil plantations and cattle ranching, which the United Nations has described as ethnic cleansing. It is not up there with the human rights abuses involving killings, but displacement is important, as is the question whether the new land and victims law will provide reparation and restitution for those people. What role does the Minister feel Britain has to play, particularly when British commercial interests are involved in such land grabs? How does he think that we can resolve the issue and return land to people?

I know that the Minister has visited Colombia twice and that he met President Santos in Peru as well as this week. He has had a lot of time to get a feel for the new regime. Does he feel that the agenda is moving forward and that we are making progress in pushing Colombia on human rights abuses? In particular, what has he learned from this week’s visit?