E/CN.4/1997/71/Add.1 page 16 61. Moreover, organizations representing the indigenous populations (ONIC, OREWA) informed the Special Rapporteur that the ministerial departments involved in indigenous affairs or the municipalities which receive the funds earmarked for the resguardos fail to pass on a considerable proportion of them. This problem, in conjunction with the land issue, led to the peaceful occupation of INCORA's regional headquarters in Quibdo and the headquarters of the Colombian Episcopal Conference in Bogotá, which was witnessed by the Special Rapporteur on 11 and 15 July 1996. E. Ubiquitous violence 62. The indigenous and Afro-Colombian populations are seriously affected by violence, trapped as they are in the crossfire between the army, the drug-traffickers, the guerrilla movements and the paramilitary groups. In rural areas, where the problem of land ownership and use arises, whether to grow lawful or unlawful crops or to exploit mineral resources, Amerindian and Afro-Colombian leaders are murdered by members of paramilitary organizations armed by landowners or drug-traffickers. The establishment of military bases on the indigenous territories and in the Afro-Colombian communities is perceived as an act of cultural aggression. Moreover, the communities are suffering from the war between the guerrillas and the army, although they are alien to the conflict. Each of the sides involved in the military conflict expects the communities to support its own military strategy, with total disregard for their basic living conditions; as a result, the combatants consider them to be political enemies and legitimate military targets. 63. Since 1990, more than 87 indigenous leaders have been murdered. Many murders have still not been elucidated, such as the killing by hired assassins, in May 1994, of the leader of the Tolima Regional Indigenous Council (CRIT), Yesid Bocanegra Martínez. Nor has any punitive action been taken in response to the massacre, in December 1990, of three Arzario Indians, including the indigenous governor Angel María Torres, known as “El momo”, and the indigenous leader Hugues Chaparro; according to the report by the prosecution service, members of La Popa battalion from Valledupar in northern Colombia were involved in this incident. Despite the disciplinary penalties imposed by the prosecution service, the military personnel suspected of this triple homicide were acquitted of all criminal charges by the military criminal court. 24 64. The situation is particularly tragic in the Uraba region (Chocó and Antioquia departments), where violence is endemic on account of the clashes between the army, paramilitary groups and drug-traffickers. Many communities have been displaced. In June 1996, 165 families belonging to the Zenú indigenous community in the municipality of Necoclí (Antioquia department) in north-west Colombia had to flee from their territory on account of the war. 65. In the towns of Buenaventura and Tumaco, hired killers and members of the police carry out “cleaning-up” ( limpieza ) operations, murdering young Afro-Colombians whom they wrongly assume to be thieves. Graffiti encouraging people to kill Blacks have frequently appeared on the walls of Buenaventura: Hágale un favor a la pátria. Mate un negro y reclame un pavo - literally, “Do your country a good turn: kill a nigger and win a turkey”. Police officers have been blamed for these graffiti.

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