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September 21, 2009

UN: Human Rights Defenders Subjected to Abuse in Colombia
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A top United Nations official says human rights defenders are still the
subject of widespread abuses in Colombia. UN special rapporteur Margaret
Sekaggya said human rights defenders are arbitrarily arrested and
detained, sometimes on a massive scale, while high-level government
officials often stigmatize them, saying they are colluding with
“terrorists” or “guerrillas.”

Margaret Sekaggya: “Journalists, trade unions, magistrates, lawyers,
students and youth activists, women defenders, indigenous and
Afro-Colombian leaders, the LGBT activists have been killed, tortured,
ill-treated, disappeared, threatened, arbitrarily arrested and
detained.”



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