Colombia Is Uncovering Right-Wing Militias’ Mass Graves
Recently, Colombia discovered mass graves in a cemetery over 150 years old in the city of Cúcuta. The bodies, many of which were smuggled into the graveyard this century, reveal unpleasant connections between right-wing militias, business, and the state.
Mourners visit graves at the Cementerio Central in Cúcuta, Colombia, where authorities have discovered hundreds of murdered or disappeared bodies. (Courtesy of Kurt Hollander)
In May, Cúcuta, a Colombian city of one million people located on the border with Venezuela, became the focus of attention of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), the government institution in charge of identifying, documenting, and establishing the responsibility for the deaths of victims in the country’s ongoing armed conflict.
After testimony from a paramilitary commander revealed the existence of mass graves within the city, the JEP, in its largest and most critical intervention ever, shut down Cúcuta’s Cementerio Central and designated it a major crime scene. Forensic investigators working for the JEP uncovered ten unmarked mass graves within the cemetery, from which they dug up thousands of decomposing black bags full of decaying corpses and crumbling bones. In the plot surrounding a nineteenth century Italian marble monument, they discovered an extra one thousand bodies in deep pits piled up on top of each other.
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