Post-war Violence against Human Rights Defenders and State Protection in Colombia

Abstract

In transitions from armed conflict, human rights defenders play an important role: in many cases, they are the local protagonists of the peace process. At the same time, they are at high risk of becoming victims of post-war violence. This article explores how states can protect defenders from such violence by presenting a case study of the Colombian transition, which has been characterized by high rates of homicides of defenders and threats against their physical integrity. Based on qualitative interviews with experts involved in protection, the article argues that violence against defenders may evolve into a systemic problem in post-conflict settings. In such contexts, protection must go beyond providing individual security measures to defenders at risk. Instead, it should follow a collective approach that emphasizes the security of communities and organizations, strengthens their capacities and relations with the state, and strives to dismantle the armed groups responsible for attacking defenders.

They cut his throat at the riverside. We called the police to collect the body, but they refused to go; they said it could be a trap. So, we had to recover the body ourselves (Interview with human rights defender, January 2019).

In transitions from internal armed conflicts, violence often persists in the post-conflict stage. While peace agreements lead to decreases in violence in some transition countries, others experience increases in homicide rates and other violent crimes, despite the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of armed groups (Steenkamp 2011; Nussio and Howe 2016). In the peacebuilding literature, this phenomenon has been subject to extensive research, pointing to various causal mechanisms between war and post-war violence (Gartner and Kennedy 2018). These include traumatization and socialization processes during war, which may lead to a ‘culture of violence’ (Steenkamp 2014), but also economic and governance problems arising in the transition, such as unemployment (Rivera 2016), the persistence of war economies (Kurtenbach and Rettberg 2018), insufficient reintegration programmes and weak law enforcement (Kurtenbach 2013; Boyle 2014). While the causes of post-war violence are well understood, the debate sometimes lacks a victim-centred perspective that examines differential impacts on vulnerable groups. One such group is human rights defenders (henceforth: defenders) working in post-conflict settings, who face heightened risks of becoming victims of post-war crime (Forst 2018). A defender is any person who acts to protect and promote human rights through peaceful means, individually or with others. This includes human rights organization staff, but also community leaders and ordinary people in remote areas, who may not even be aware that they are defending human rights. Above all, defenders are defined by what they do (UN General Assembly 2017, 2018; UN OHCHR 2020). In post-conflict settings, this may involve investigating and documenting human rights violations and international crimes; supporting, mobilizing and representing affected communities; providing humanitarian aid; or cooperating with state agencies in the implementation of peace policies. As such, defenders are of decisive importance for a successful transition from armed conflict: in many cases, they are the local protagonists of the peace process.

Yet, despite this important role, little research examines the alarming rates of post-war violence against defenders in transition countries (UN Human Rights Council 2019a). The same applies to protection mechanisms for defenders against such violence. In this area, most research looks at international protection mechanisms, such as the monitoring and complaints procedures of international organizations, or at protection schemes administered by private actors, including nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) (Nah et al. 2013; Bennett et al. 2015). In contrast, public protection mechanisms at the national level have received less attention thus far, although states are the main duty bearers to protect defenders under international law (UN General Assembly 1998). The few works that examine state-based protection regimes show that these are still underdeveloped in many countries and that defenders mostly rely on community- and family-based protection strategies (Neto 2018; Cousins and Schmitz 2020; Hernawan and Nah 2020; Ichim and Mutahi 2020). These studies point to the importance of strengthening state-based mechanisms and adopting a holistic protection approach: instead of solely focusing on individual physical security, states should create an enabling environment for the defence of human rights, by building public support and acceptance for defenders and by enacting measures to prevent risks and counter impunity (Nah 2020: 170f.). In addition, these mechanisms should not only target individuals, but also collectives, and be based on meaningful collaboration between defenders and state authorities (ibid.). However, most of this literature lacks a clear conflict nexus, looking rather at state perpetrators than armed groups, and concentrates on assessing physical protection programmes from the perspective of defenders.

The present article complements this research by presenting an in-depth case study of the Colombian protection regime that emphasizes the views of state actors and the justice function of protection frameworks in a post-conflict context, which involves specific challenges for protecting defenders. First, the article introduces the phenomenon of post-war violence against defenders in Colombia after the Final Agreement to End the Armed Conflict and Build a Stable and Lasting Peace with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—People’s Army (FARC-EP) of November 2016. This agreement led to the demobilization of more than 12,000 FARC-EP members and significantly reduced the numbers of homicides attributable to the armed conflict. However, the implementation of its more transformative elements, such as its political and rural reforms, has been difficult and accompanied by high rates of violence against defenders (KROC Institute for International Peace Studies 2019): according to the UN, 303 defenders were killed between 2017 and 2019, but figures from other organizations are much higher (UN Security Council 2019b; Defensoría del Pueblo Colombia 2019; Somos Defensores 2019). In fact, there has been an increase in homicides of defenders since the adoption of the agreement, which has also been accompanied by high rates of threats and attacks against their physical integrity, often resulting in forced displacements. Acknowledging that such violence has always characterized the armed conflict and constitutes a multicausal phenomenon, the article argues that its recent increase reflects a systemic outcome of the country’s post-conflict dynamic that is related to a growing fragmentation of armed groups competing for the control of war economies. The article then proceeds to examine the national protection regime for defenders. Driven by the extent of the problem, Colombia has built perhaps the world’s most comprehensive governance framework to protect defenders, which incorporates many recommendations formulated in the literature. Over the years, the country has changed its approach to protecting defenders: away from the reactive provision of physical security measures to individuals at risk to a more progressive policy that emphasizes prevention, accountability, decentralization, participation, and collective security. After describing the historical development of this regime, the article analyses the vast obstacles, as well as the main advances, that characterize its implementation, focusing on the justice sector. As such, the case constitutes a valuable experience for other transition countries to learn from when designing and implementing protection mechanisms.

Methodologically, the article is based on 22 qualitative interviews and focus groups with experts conducted by the author in January 2019 in Bogotá and Medellín. These include defenders affected by post-war violence and currently benefiting from protection schemes (3 persons) as well as civil society representatives working on the protection of defenders, including the Comisión Colombiana de Juristas, Colectivo de Abogados José Alvear Restrepo, Dejusticia, Kroc Institute, and Somos Defensores (5). However, the fieldwork concentrated on the state entities responsible for the formulation and implementation of the country’s protection framework. In this regard, interviews were conducted in the Presidency (1); the Ministry of Defense (3); the Ministry of the Interior (1); the Attorney General’s Office, including its Special Investigation Unit (Unidad Especial de Investigación, 5); the Procurator’s Office (Procuraduría General de la Nación, 1); the Ombudsman’s Office (Defensoría General de la Nación, 1); the National Police, including its Special Forces (Cuerpo Élite, 2); the National Protection Unit (Unidad Nacional de Protección,1); and the National Commission on Security Guarantees (Comisión Nacional de Garantías de Seguridad, 1). The interviews followed the logic of explorative expert interviews based on semi-structured questionnaires tailored to the specific expertise of the interviewees. Given the difficulties of accessing the field, in particular with respect to the public administration, interview partners were chosen through snowball sampling. The interviews were conducted in Spanish and then partially transcribed and coded, with a view to identifying the main advances and obstacles in the protection framework. All interviewees gave their free and informed consent to participate in the research and, if applicable, to be recorded and cited in the article. The author translated all quotations from Spanish into English. To protect the identities of interview partners, all quotations were pseudonymized while contextual information that could reveal their identity was changed, including names of victims, perpetrators and places. The Tilburg Law School Ethics Review Board granted ethical clearance to the research.

1. Violence against defenders: a constant feature of the Colombian armed conflict

Although violence against defenders has increased since the adoption of the peace agreement with FARC-EP, it is not a novel phenomenon in Colombia. In fact, it has been a constant feature of the country’s internal armed conflict, which, besides the state, has involved various rebel and paramilitary groups and claimed more than eight million victims, mostly in rural and impoverished areas (Unidad de Víctimas 2020). This is reflected in 426 homicides and 255 attempted homicides against defenders reported between 2010 and 2016; that is, prior to the peace agreement (Somos Defensores 2018). While most of these crimes are attributed to organized armed and criminal groups, especially paramilitaries, several judicial decisions bear witness to the role of state authorities in persecuting defenders, including public stigmatization, illegal surveillance, unfounded criminal prosecutions, excessive use of force, and extrajudicial killings (ibid.). Such practices have been associated in particular with the Uribe government (2002–2010) and with national security and development strategies that perceive defenders as internal enemies: as political allies of the leftist insurgency or as opponents of a resource-extraction–based economic development model (Colectivo de Abogados José Alvear Restrepo 2018).

While active contributions of state actors to crimes against defenders seem to have declined in recent years, Colombia had the highest numbers of homicides of defenders in Latin America between 2016 and 2019; that is, after the adoption of the peace agreement (UN Human Rights Council 2019b: 6). Out of the 365 killings verified by the UN in that period, 64.4 per cent occurred in rural areas, in particular those suffering from weak state presence, multidimensional poverty, endemic violence, illicit economies and the presence of organized armed and criminal groups (Fiscalía General de la Nación 2020; UN Human Rights Council 2020). Such groups are responsible for 59.79 per cent of the homicides verified by the UN in which law enforcement authorities were able to identify the presumed perpetrator (Fiscalía General de la Nación 2020). The group most severely affected was members of community action councils, accounting for 33.15 per cent of the victims (ibid.). These councils constitute the main bodies for political participation at the community level. Composed of local residents, they play a fundamental role in organizing the community and often serve as intermediaries with state authorities. Community leaders promoting human rights and development initiatives outside of such councils were also heavily affected, accounting for 21.1 per cent of the verified homicides, followed by leaders representing indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities (19.72 per cent) and peasant leaders (7.95 per cent; ibid.) This indicates that post-war violence against defenders in Colombia is largely a rural phenomenon related to the presence of armed groups that primarily affects community leaders at the local level. Often, these leaders are also the local promotors of the peace process: those who build trust between communities and state institutions that have been absent or dysfunctional for many years and who cooperate with state institutions in implementing peacebuilding programmes at the local level. (Naranjo Escobar 2020). With the killings of these persons, the communities lose the expertise and relationships necessary to effectively participate in the peace process. Moreover, the killings discourage others from taking a leadership role and cooperating with state authorities. As such, they constitute a fundamental risk to the peace process.

Another group exposed to heightened risks is defenders of land and environmental rights, who are often from ethnic communities (Comisión Colombiana de Juristas et al. 2018; UN Human Rights Council 2019b). This includes, for example, persons who defend the rights of indigenous peoples to their territories and a healthy environment against economic interests, in particular relating to large-scale agro-industry, forestry, energy and infrastructure investments, but also with respect to licit and illicit mining. In addition, post-war violence affects defenders involved in the restitution of lands dispossessed during the armed conflict: 45 land restitution leaders have been killed since 2011 (Procuraduría General de la Nación 2018). Finally, female and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) defenders face aggravated risks of becoming victims of post-war violence, given that they defend rights in a society where patriarchal practices and discrimination persist (UN Human Rights Council 2019b; Ministerio del Interior 2018a). The armed groups are frequently characterized by a culture of hegemonic masculinity and do not accept that these persons defend their rights. They read their leadership as an affront, and attack them with the objective of sending a message of intimidation (ibid: 25). Such attacks take a differential form, often involving sexual violence or torture, and also cause differential impacts. In a context of widespread gender-based violence and inequality, they weaken the few organizations that advocate against discrimination of women and LGBTI persons, undermining the protection of these groups (Defensoría del Pueblo 2018a).

While violence against defenders is, consequently, neither a novel nor a monocausal phenomenon in Colombia, many observers attribute its recent increase to gaps in the peace process with FARC-EP. Despite their demobilization, the state has not succeeded in establishing sufficient military and civilian presence to stabilize the territories previously controlled by the rebels (UN Security Council 2019). Instead, other or newly formed organized armed and criminal groups have expanded their presence in these regions, where they violently compete for the control of the remaining war economies, including drug-trafficking, mining and extortion (Defensoría del Pueblo 2017, 2018b, 2019). This dynamic largely reflects what Nussio and Howe (2016) describe as a breakdown of a monopolistic illegal protection system. According to this theory of post-war violence, armed groups impose order over territories where they hold a monopoly of force to extract the rents of war economies, in particular with respect to extortion. In Colombia, one important control instrument in this context is to create networks of informants, who report relevant information to the armed groups. Furthermore, the groups also create social rules, limiting freedom of movement, imposing dress codes and regulating community conflicts, for example relating to theft, fights or family violence (MAPP/OEA 2019). These monopolistic protection systems can result in a containment of violence (Nussio and Howe 2016). However, with the demobilization of armed groups, they may collapse in the sense that ‘criminal networks and remobilized armed groups […] compete for existing illegal rents of war economies and [that] such competition is likely managed through violent repression’ (ibid: 850f).

Today, the departments suffering from violent disputes between organized armed and criminal groups also exhibit the highest rates of post-war violence against defenders. These include Cauca, accounting for 16.16 per cent of the homicides documented by the UN between 2016 and 2019; Antioquia (14.52 per cent); Norte de Santander (8.77 per cent); Valle del Cauca (7.12 per cent); Caquetá (5.75 per cent); and Nariño (4.93 per cent; Fiscalía General de la Nación 2020). All of these departments are either characterized by large areas of illicit crops or constitute strategic drug-trafficking corridors hosting high numbers of laboratories. At the same time, some of them are also important illegal gold mining hubs (UNODC/Gobierno de Colombia 2018: 67; Defensoría del Pueblo 2018a: 29f.).¹ In these territories, community leaders face increased risks of becoming victims of post-war crime, given that they are caught between the interests of competing groups seeking to exercise control over the territory and the population: ‘When an armed group arrives in a territory, the first persons they approach are the leaders. They give them three options: to work with them, to close their eyes and shut up, or to leave’ (Interview with Defensoría del Pueblo, January 2019). In territories in dispute, various groups may force the leaders to cooperate, for example, by requiring them to provide information, to collect extortion proceeds on their behalf, or to ensure that the coca leaves or paste produced in the community are exclusively sold to them. This draws the leaders into the conflict between the competing groups—when they support one group, they almost inevitably become a military target for the other:

The leader they killed had only two small fields of coca. The family had always sold it to the FARC, but then the Gulf Clan arrived. They told them to stop selling to others and instead sell to them. To get rid of the problem, the family decided to sell half to the residual group of the FARC and half to the Gulf Clan. But the residual group was no longer in control of the area. When the Gulf Clan found out, they killed him. (Interview with public prosecutor, January 2019)

Moreover, when an armed group enters a territory historically controlled by another one, it may kill the leaders simply because it considers them supporters of the other group or to set an example, given that such killings also serve a symbolic function of reminding communities of who is in control and thus ensuring their cooperation. Another major risk factor in areas where armed groups are present, also in the absence of a territorial dispute, is cooperation with state authorities. This of course includes denouncing the actions of armed groups to law enforcement agencies:

Miguel was killed because he opposed the Gulf Clan. […] When they set up a meeting with the community, he called the police. They sent a group of special forces and the paramilitaries had to run. From that moment, they declared him a military target. The police came, they inspected the area, found nothing and left. But the paramilitaries concluded that it was him who had called the police, that he was a sapo (an informant). (Interview with public prosecutor, January 2019)

In addition, defenders face risks when they act against the war economies financing the armed groups because of their negative social and environmental impacts on communities. This applies, for example, to defenders denouncing illegal mining operations or promoting illicit crop substitution, who often become victims of post-war violence (Guevara 2019). Furthermore, there have been cases involving ‘licit’ business activities, for example, homicides of land restitution leaders who oppose palm oil companies operating on the lands of forcibly displaced communities:

In Bajo Cauca, there were massive displacements in the era of paramilitarism and persons with large economic power took advantage of them. Many businessmen came and started to sow palm tree […]. We found that the leaders were killed by the Caparros, in their majority former paramilitaries. But the threats emanated from those businessmen […]. They eradicated the crops [of the returning communities]. It came to a point that they burned their houses, because they don’t want to lose the land. […] In the homicides, it is not proven that these businessmen intervened. […] But we found that one of them owns 41 properties all over the country, with only one credit application in a bank. That can be an issue of money laundering. (Interview with public prosecutor, January 2019)

This case points to different forms of private sector involvement in post-war violence against defenders by armed groups. Besides contract killings, these groups may harm defenders because the companies they oppose are owned by frontmen. In addition, a business enterprise may constitute a significant source of extortion and diversion of public funds or an important stimulus for real estate prices that the armed groups can take advantage of, including by displacing communities and selling their properties (Massé and Le Billon 2018; Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica 2016). In this context, it has been argued that armed groups anticipate the arrival of companies, ‘clearing their way to operate without resistance by local communities’ (OECD 2017: 23).

In sum, violence against defenders constitutes a multifaceted phenomenon in Colombia, which deserves deeper analysis with respect to each group within the broader group of defenders. However, some patterns seem to have changed in recent years, in accordance with the transformation of the armed conflict: with the demobilizations of two major and, in large parts, politically motivated groups, together with the change in government from the hardline and transgressive Uribe to the moderate Santos presidency in 2010, it seems that cases of politically motivated crimes against defenders involving state authorities have declined in the last decade. Today, violence against defenders rather revolves around territorial disputes between armed groups for the control of war economies, with a causal relationship between the growing fragmentation of these groups and the increase in violence after the FARC-EP peace agreement.²

2. State protection of defenders in Colombia

According to the American Convention on Human Rights, states have a duty to respect the rights of defenders and to prevent and protect them against violations of their rights. Consequently, for member states such as Colombia, these are binding obligations under international law. To meet these responsibilities, states should pursue an integral protection policy for defenders that involves three pillars—prevention, protection and accountability:

An integral protection policy includes measures directed at preventing human rights violations, at removing obstacles faced by human rights defenders, and at guaranteeing that state agents abstain from interfering or curtailing their rights. These measures should be joined by public policies, laws, and measures aimed at increasing awareness of the key role of human rights defenders in society and among public officials; and the fostering of a safe environment for the performance of their work. In addition, one of the essential components of an integral protection policy is to include measures for the physical protection of human rights defenders that are at risk as a result of their activities, in such a way that they may continue their work in safe and secure conditions. Finally, an integral protection policy must also be accompanied by measures aimed at eradicating impunity for violations of the rights of human rights defenders, through diligent and exhaustive investigations, persecution and sanction of material and intellectual authors of the crime. (IAHCR 2017: 23f.)

Colombia has been regarded as ‘a pioneer’ in protecting defenders because it created a physical protection programme for defenders at risk as far back as 1997 (ibid: 79). Since then, its protection regime has grown significantly: as of 2018, Colombia had more than 14 relevant laws and decrees, involving 18 institutional bodies (for an overview, see Ministerio del Interior 2018b: 19f.). More importantly, its strategy of protecting defenders evolved over that period: from an approach primarily focused on ensuring the physical security of individuals at risk towards a more integral policy that takes greater account of prevention and accountability.

The first instrument adopted in this context was Law 418 of 1997, which required the Ministry of the Interior to set up a physical protection programme for leaders and activists against political violence. This law laid the foundation for the Colombian protection regime. While the law has been modified continuously over the years, this physical protection programme continues to operate today, and the Ministry of the Interior is still the principal government entity responsible for designing the policy of protecting defenders (Somos Defensores 2017). In the following years, the most important instruments were Decrees 978 and 1592 of 2000 and Decrees 1286 and 2742 of 2002. These aimed to protect specific populations at risk, including left-wing opposition parties, journalists and local politicians. In 2006, the government adopted Decree 2816 to formalize the administration of the protection programme. This instrument regulated the risk assessment process and the ensuing protection measures, including temporary relocations, vehicles, bullet-proof vests and bodyguards. In addition, it defined a number of preventative measures, such as self-protection trainings for defenders and police patrols around defenders’ homes. Yet, protection was still largely understood from an individual security perspective.

The National Police and the Administrative Department of Security, at that time the country’s main intelligence agency, were responsible to implement these measures. However, in 2010, the government dissolved the Department, given that it had not only supported paramilitary groups, but also surveilled opposition leaders and defenders under the Uribe presidency, that is, the very same population it was tasked to protect. In response, the government adopted Decree 4065 of 2011. This Decree transferred the responsibility to implement physical protection programmes to the newly created and specialized National Protection Unit (UNP), which forms part of the Ministry of the Interior, but enjoys legal, administrative and financial autonomy. Since then, UNP has been responsible for providing protection services to defenders, including the processing of protection requests, the conduct of risk assessments, and the implementation and follow up of approved protection measures (IAHCR 2017: 79f.).

In this period, Colombia’s approach to protecting defenders also advanced. In 2009, the National Roundtable on Guarantees for Human Rights Defenders was founded. This is a dialogue forum between government and civil society to discuss relevant political, legislative and institutional measures, accompanied by the international community. This format takes place at the national and also at the regional level. It has not only improved coordination between civil society and state actors, but also the latter’s understanding of the conditions that defenders face and their commitment towards protecting them (Somos Defensores 2017: 159). These advances are reflected in Decree 4912 of 2011, which clarified the responsibilities of the different state entities involved in the protection regime. More importantly, it broadened the regime’s scope by requiring state entities to develop a comprehensive prevention strategy. At the heart of this new strategy was the creation of local prevention roundtables. These roundtables comprise all relevant state entities and are tasked with identifying and projecting risk scenarios; formulating, implementing and following-up risk mitigation plans; and engaging in dialogue with local communities. As such, this new strategy also decentralized the protection regime, integrating governors and mayors more strongly. In addition, the decree introduced a differential approach to evaluating risks and adopting protection measures, requiring the authorities to consider specific vulnerabilities associated with age, ethnicity, gender, disability, sexual orientation and the urban or rural residence of the beneficiaries.

In 2011, Colombia also adopted the Victims and Land Restitution Law (Law 1448 of 2011), which constitutes the country’s most important restorative transitional justice instrument, providing survivors of the armed conflict with access to integral reparation. As a part of this agenda, this law strengthened the rights of applicants for protection measures and enhanced the respective inter-institutional coordination mechanisms. More importantly, one of the law’s regulations, Decree 4800 of 2011, introduced the concept of collective protection for ethnic communities as well as victims and women’s organizations, amending the regime’s previous focus on individual security. Since then, this differential and collective protection approach has been taken up in further instruments. These include Decrees 4633 and 4635 of 2011, which regulated the rights of ethnic communities under the Victims and Land Restitution Law and required state authorities to provide them with collective protection measures coordinated with the communities. They also include Decree 1314 of 2015, which created a commission to formulate, implement and follow up an integral programme to protect female defenders, introduced in 2018 (Ministerio del Interior 2018a).

In the peace process with FARC-EP, the government adopted several other instruments to protect defenders (and also demobilizing rebels and communities participating in the implementation of peace policies). Among those is Decree 2078 of 2017, which regulated the collective protection programme within the UNP. This programme provides communities and organizations with access to measures such as infrastructure improvements, organization-strengthening or capacity-building, for example, with respect to self-protection. Other measures may include to increase the presence of public institutions in conflict-affected territories or to improve interaction of organizations and communities with these institutions. Furthermore, the peace process led to the adoption of instruments to dismantle the armed and criminal groups responsible for attacking defenders. In this context, Decree 154 of 2017 established the National Commission on Security Guarantees, tasked with designing and following up the public and criminal policy to dismantle organizations that attack and threaten defenders. The most innovative aspect of this new body is that it not only comprises the relevant state authorities, but also representatives of civil society. Decree 898 of 2017, for its part, created the Special Investigation Unit as an autonomous entity within the Attorney General’s Office to dismantle these organizations, including their support networks, and promote the investigation of crimes against defenders.

In addition, the peace process has resulted in several instruments that strengthen the prevention of human rights violations against defenders and further decentralize the protection regime by engaging local authorities more strongly. The foundation of this strategy was laid by Decree 1581 of 2017, which formulated a new public policy to prevent violations of the rights to life, integrity, freedom and security against persons, groups and communities. With respect to defenders, this policy focuses on two pillars. First, it aims to prevent stigmatization by requiring the authorities to organize public events and educational activities that highlight the importance of defenders and increase their recognition. Second, it seeks to prevent violations by strengthening the implementation of prevention and protection programmes at the local level, by increasing the participation of civil society in these programmes, and by improving the coordination between the respective institutions. In this context, the decree established various measures, for example, requiring the UNP to develop outreach activities to familiarize communities with available protection programmes. The UNP also has to formulate plans on how to improve its cooperation with local authorities in implementing these programmes. Moreover, the decree obliges the UNP to create a coordination mechanism with the Attorney General’s Office, so that acts leading to the provision of a protection scheme are adequately investigated and punished by the criminal justice system. Perhaps more importantly, the decree strengthens the participation of civil society in identifying and preventing risks, requiring the Ministry of the Interior to establish respective forums. Furthermore, the decree seeks to strengthen the capabilities of communities to defend human rights. To this end, it mandates he authorities to provide human rights education in rural areas on serveral topics, includingorganization building and management, participation in politics, rights-enforcement mechanisms, dispute resolution and report-drafting.

This new prevention policy was complemented by several other decrees. These include Decree 2252 of 2017, which clarified the responsibilities of governors, mayors and local police officers as first responders to risk situations faced by defenders, and also Decree 2124 of 2017, which introduced a new alert and prevention system to rapidly respond to such risks. This system consists in two parts. On the basis of it’s monitoring activities in the territories, the Ombudsman’s Office releases early warnings on potential rights violations. Committees comprising national- and local-level state entities then coordinate and implement urgent preventative measures. Decree 660 of 2018 regulates the Integral Security and Protection Program for Communities and Organizations with the objective of preventing human rights violations against them and their leaders. To this end, the decree obliged governors and mayors to develop integral prevention plans, identifying risks and defining early preventative measures, to improve their coordination with communities and organizations and to publicly recognize and support their work. It sets out a detailed list of measures, including educational and cultural activities to build capacities among communities and organizations and to prevent stigmatization, but also measures to strengthen their communication, for example, supporting internet access. Furthermore, the decree requires the military and the police to maintain expeditious communication channels and hold regular meetings with communities and organizations at risk. In addition, it stipulates preventative deployments to ensure an effective presence in affected territories and protect organizations and communities. Besides prevention, the decree also established a new protection protocol for rural communities, which requires local authorities to set up a mechanism to receive information and analyse risk situations and to define and implement respective preventative or protection measures in coordination with the affected organizations and communities. These may include, for example, trainings in self-protection and capacity-building activities, political statements and campaigns demanding respect for human rights, or architectural protection measures, such as shelters or fences. Moreover, the decree aims to enhance access to justice by increasing the reporting of risks and violations by organizations and communities in rural areas, for example, through mobile judiciary deployments. Institutionally, this decentralization of the prevention and protection architecture is reflected in the creation of local-level committees responsible for implementing the different pillars formulated in the decree.

In sum, Colombia has built an extensive protection framework for defenders that involves numerous legal instruments and institutional bodies. In fact, this framework has grown to be so complex that the current Duque government created an action plan to better articulate and coordinate the different entities and programmes. (Decree 2137 of 2018; Ministerio del Interior 2018a, 2020). The quantitative increase in protection instruments also reflects a qualitative evolution in the country’s policy towards protecting defenders. Over the years, the initial and rather reactive approach of providing physical security measures to individuals at risk has evolved into a more progressive regime that emphasizes the prevention and investigation of rights violations as well as collective protection measures for communities and organizations. This more progressive approach also considers their differential needs, for example, with respect to their ethnic identity. In addition, the current framework recognizes that prevention and protection measures cannot be designed and implemented by state actors or from the central level alone. Instead, they need to be coordinated with public authorities in the respective territories and, more importantly, with their beneficiaries, on a case-by-case basis. In other words, the regime today recognizes that decentralizing and increasing the participation of civil society in protection and prevention policies is key for their effectiveness. Furthermore, the regime today acknowledges that building trust between civil society and state actors and strengthening the capacities of communities to defend their rights are essential prerequisites for the functioning of these mechanisms. Especially, this applies to contexts of armed conflict involving human rights violations and stigmatization of defenders by state actors as well as long-term dysfunctionality of the public administration. Yet, these advances have not been able to restrain the increase in post-war violence against defenders after the peace agreement, partly because they are relatively recent, with many of the newer instruments still lacking full implementation.

3. Gaps in protection: the insufficiency of individual physical security

Driven by civil society, the evolution of the Colombian protection regime reflects a learning curve: that material security measures for individuals at risk are insufficient to guarantee the physical integrity of defenders and their right to defend rights in transitions from armed conflict. In practice, measures such as bodyguards, armoured vehicles, cell phones, panic buttons, direct lines of communication with police officers, and temporary relocations have been at the centre of the Colombian protection regime (Interviews with Ombudsman’s Office, National Commission on Security Guarantees, Presidency, and UNP, January 2019). However, they have proven inadequate in many cases. On one hand, there are delays in the provision of protection schemes. In some instances, defenders have been killed while their applications were in progress. On the other hand, despite the respective legal requirements, the assigned measures sometimes fail to consider the differential needs of their beneficiaries. Female defenders, for example, have stated repeatedly that the available physical security measures do not meet their needs, including bulletproof vests tailored to women, female instead of male bodyguards in their homes, or bodyguards aware of gender discrimination (IAHCR 2019). In addition, the assigned measures do sometimes not consider the geographical circumstances of the respective territories:

One day, José went out to vaccinate his cattle. When he arrived, three men of the Gulf Clan appeared and got him off his horse. They shot him 15 times. He had a protection scheme, but weaker measures. He only had a bulletproof vest and a cell phone. But there, in Chocó, you will never see a campesino wearing a vest working the land. It is 30 degrees there. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

There have also been cases in which the state provided vehicles to defenders living in areas with few roads, but river-based transport, or in which it provided cell phones in territories without reception (IAHCR 2019). More fundamentally, the Colombian experience calls into question whether individual protection schemes in the form of bodyguards, armoured vehicles and bulletproof vests are really suitable to mitigate risks in contexts of widespread and systematic violence in remote and isolated areas with poor infrastructure. In some rural sectors, the homes of protected persons do not have road access, which implies that the beneficiaries must walk and leave their security scheme behind. The bodyguards return to their municipal offices, giving rise to gaps in protection:

They killed him in front of his wife, his sons, his grandchildren. They took him out of his house and shot him. They shot him 19 times. His sons saw everything, his grandchildren, too. Why did they kill him there? Because they found out that he didn’t have the protection scheme in his house. The bodyguards only accompanied him in the transfers, leaving him at the entry of his home. But it’s one thing to be on your own in the city, and another to be on your own in the middle of the jungle. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

Furthermore, the level of protection that bodyguards, armoured vehicles and bulletproof vests can offer is very limited in areas controlled by armed groups in which even the law enforcement entities only enter accompanied by the military:

Each and every day, hundreds of people are threatened. But the National Protection Unit, all they do is give you a vest and a cell phone. That’s not protection. That doesn’t work. In the countryside, if you have a bodyguard, they just kill both of you. They come with ten men with rifles. They take away your gun, kill you both and leave you there. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

In fact, there are areas where persons prefer not to use their protection scheme, believing that it increases their visibility and the risk of victimization, given that the armed groups associate these schemes with informants (Interview with police officer, January 2019). In addition, defenders often stress that individual measures are insufficient, because they do not cover their families and other members of their organizations or communities. Individual protection measures ignore the fact that the defence of human rights is usually not driven by a single person, but constitutes a collective enterprise (IAHCR 2019). These cases point to the importance of coordinating physical protection measures with beneficiaries on a case-by-case basis and of adopting a collective security approach that goes beyond the standard solution of providing guards, vehicles and vests to individuals:

We insist on collective measures rather than individual ones. For example, it helps us to regularly meet and analyse what is happening in the territory, which groups arrived, what their interest is, whether they put us at risk, whether we have to lower our profile, not take certain routes, cancel a protest… The intention is to anticipate what can happen and take care. For that, we need a safe place, with cameras and security. But the state declined it. Another measure we solicited was food and medicine for our dogs. […] We all have dogs. They warn us. When somebody is coming to kill us, we can run. For me, a dog is more effective than a gun. I am a pacifist. I don’t want a gun and they would take it away from me. We also told the state to not only give us cell phones, but also a solar panel, because there is no electricity to charge it. But that is not in their catalogue. […] Their conception of security is different. When we asked for food for our dogs, they said we were crazy. (Interview with defender, January 2019)

Recognizing such concerns, the Colombian government has recently strengthened the collective protection approach. With the respective amendments of the legal framework, as of 2019, the UNP implemented 72 collective protection programmes, granting measures such as radios, boats and training, for example, to community-based indigenous guards. In the same year, it operated 4,795 individual protection schemes for defenders. However, the demand for protection is much higher: in 2019, 112 applications for collective measures were pending, mostly by ethnic groups, but also by victims’ and human rights organizations. In 2018, the UNP received 3,125 applications for individual measures, out of which it granted 411 (IAHCR 2019). In fact, it may be said that the UNP is overwhelmed by the demand for protective measures. Although its budget has grown substantially and continuously over the years, it regularly operates at the brink of financial collapse (Semana 2014, 2019). This demonstrates the insufficiency of a protection approach built on the reactive provision of material security measures in transitions from armed conflict: the state simply cannot afford to provide such measures to all defenders at risk, including community leaders, particularly where these measures consist of vehicles and guards. In contexts of widespread post-war violence, material protection measures are a necessary, but not a sufficient component of protecting defenders.

4. Holding the perpetrators of post-war violence to account: lack of criminal liability

The insufficiency of material security arrangements has also been recognized by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights: Simply providing physical protection to defenders at risk, without investigating the origin of the threats made against them, does not constitute an integral protection policy (IACHR 2017: 65). In fact, according to the Commission, ‘the most effective means for protecting human rights defenders […] is to systematically carry out effective investigations of all the acts of violence against them [and] to punish both the direct perpetrators and those who planned and ordered the violations’ (ibid: 52). However, the investigation of crimes against defenders has been weak in Colombia. According to a study analysing the outcomes of 458 investigations of crimes against defenders between 2009 and 2016, based on data from the Attorney General’s Office, 305 had not reached the trial stage, without accusation, and 46 had been archived. Only 28, that is, 6 per cent of the investigations, had resulted in a sentence (Somos Defensores 2017: 51). The high rates of impunity for crimes against defenders are due to the dysfunctionality of the criminal justice system in the regions most severely affected by the armed conflict. In this context, one aspect is the precarious presence of the law enforcement agencies:

Bajo Baudó is a very remote and very poor municipality, with high levels of violence. It’s three hours away from a larger village, by dirt road, in the middle of the jungle. They have two prosecutors and one member of the judicial police. In those areas, it is very difficult to investigate killings of leaders. […] The prosecutors lack capacities, a lot, in legal issues, technical issues, how to investigate, how to bring those cases beyond the preliminary stage. The investigators of the judicial police are unexperienced. They don’t have any resources. They don’t do genetic or ballistic tests. They don’t have anything. They take the pictures of the bodies with their cell phones. They don’t have a laboratory. Do you know how they lift the bodies? The hearse brings them to the hospital. The investigators go to the hospital to lift the body. Instead of going to the crime scene and collect the evidence, they go to the hospital to lift the body. They start working from there. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

In addition, the few and poorly equipped law enforcement agents work in areas controlled by armed groups, where they face high security risks. In these areas, police officers entrench themselves in bunker-like stations, not attending crimes outside of the urban centres:

We don’t have the capacity. When they are killing someone in a rural area four hours away from the village, well, they can call the police, but until we arrive, they have probably already killed the person. […] In some municipalities we only have five policemen. We cannot abandon the whole station to attend one case. Many times, they try to set us traps. They say something is happening somewhere and when we arrive, they wait for us with all their men. Or they attack the station while we are gone. (Interview with police officer, January 2019)

The lack of resources and high security risks imply that the police often do not visit crime scenes to collect evidence in the areas where homicides of defenders occur. Nor do they implement arrest warrants:

I can order detentions, but the police don’t go. They don’t leave the urban area. The policemen hide in the villages. So, I have to wait for a military operation, that the military captures some of them. Then I check if they also captured those persons. It’s only the military that can enter there. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

Similarly to the police, the local prosecutors sometimes shy away from advancing cases involving armed groups and instead focus on other crimes, such as theft or intra-familiar violence (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019). Furthermore, the armed groups’ control implies that communities are often unwilling to denounce crimes and to cooperate with the state, given the risk of retaliation this involves and the lack of protection:

Due to the lack of trust in state institutions and in their effectiveness, they do not report crimes. […] We have municipalities where the police can only go to one supermarket to buy food. The others don’t sell to them. And the officers have to protect the person who does. Because that person can be victimized for working with the state. (Interview with police officer, January 2019)

Moreover, some communities are also unwilling to cooperate with the authorities because they benefit from illegal mining or coca cultivation as one of the few available income opportunities (Interview with police officer, January 2019). Others have been victims of forced eradication of coca plants, forced disappearances, extrajudicial executions or other human rights violations by the public forces. In addition, the groups sometimes also enjoy some degree of support and legitimacy: In certain territories, it is not the state, but the armed group providing basic access to healthcare and social security (Interview with officer of the National Police’s Elite Forces, January 2019). Moreover, the groups have also corrupted the local state institutions in some regions, including the law enforcement agencies. This implies high risks for witnesses:

In Urabá, the criminal groups have co-opted the state. Mayors, councillors, civil servants, national police, military. There, it is difficult to investigate. The police can pass the information to the groups. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

Due to the lack of protection and trust in the state, it is common that the investigators of crimes against defenders face great difficulties in obtaining testimonies. Instead, they often have to rely on technical evidence to avoid bringing witnesses to trial, which implies high risks to their physical security:

Their fear is completely legitimate. Because there isn’t any state presence in those areas. The criminals know what’s going on, they have their intelligence. […] If they talk, they kill their family members, their brothers, their fathers. […] When armed groups are involved, the communities are always afraid to give information. They have to testify before a court, you need to bring each witness to trial. They don’t come, they get killed, they are afraid. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

In recent years, the Attorney General’s Office has taken steps to advance the investigations of crimes against defenders and reduce levels of impunity. In this context, one important step has been the adoption of a new criminal policy to dismantle organized armed and criminal groups (Directives 0001/2012 and 0002/2015). Before this reform, the prosecutors investigated each case at the same time, in the same way and as an isolated fact, without considering its context. As a consequence, the investigations relating to these groups were dispersed across different units and often focused on the material authors of the crimes, without clarifying the structures of the organizations. The reform introduced a new system of criminal investigation that allows prosecutors to prioritize cases against organized armed and criminal groups and to focus their investigative activity on the principal perpetrators, that is, on the groups’ command and control structures. These prioritizations are reflected in greater allocations of economic, technical, operational and logistical resources to certain cases and also in the formation of specialized units and working groups (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019).

Moreover, the reform has led to methodological changes in investigations. First, prosecutors can group several cases that represent common patterns, such as proximity in time and space or the usage of particular weapons or bullets, reassigning them to the specialized units. Second, prosecutors make greater use of pre-agreements with the material authors of the crimes and of imputation schemes, which allow them to prosecute the commanders of the groups, who order or approve crimes against defenders. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019). Third, the reform introduced a new methodology of ‘criminal investigation in context’, which seeks to understand the organization and operation of criminal structures, considering economic, geographical, political and social factors. Its objective is to find relationships between different cases, to reveal the criminal plans and modus operandi of the organizations, to identify and prosecute the individuals exercising important functions, including in their support networks, and to seize their assets. This new investigative strategy led to the creation of interdisciplinary units comprising prosecutors, analysts and investigators who elaborate context analyses with respect to armed groups at the national and local levels. These help to orient the investigations and can also be introduced into the proceedings (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019). These innovations constitute great advances in the country’s criminal policy:

Earlier we only investigated the direct perpetrators, case-by-case. You went to Buenavista, with one hundred homicides a year. […] When they killed a defender, they didn’t find anything. But now, with the organograms of the criminal structures, showing the commanders, the middle ranks, the members of the armed groups, there is progress. We go beyond the direct perpetrators. We can group several cases and attribute the killings to the leaders by chain of command. (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019)

More recently, the government created a Special Investigation Unit (UEI) within the Attorney General’s Office, mandated to dismantle the organizations that attack defenders. The UEI consists of specialized prosecutors, analysts and judicial police and is based in Bogotá. However, it also includes a number of teams in prioritized territories. While the UEI has, thus far, mostly focused on homicides of demobilized FARC-EP members, it also supports and coordinates with local prosecutors in the investigations of homicides of defenders, supporting them to bring these cases to trial. In addition, due to its superior resources, the UEI is able to visit crime scenes and take out witnesses from areas where regular prosecutors do not enter for security reasons (Interview with prosecutor, January 2019). The UEI’s counterpart in dismantling organized armed and criminal groups is the Elite Corps of the National Police, which was founded in 2017 with 1,088 officers across the national territory (National Police 2017).

Moreover, the Attorney General’s Office adopted Directive 0002/2017, which formulates standards for the investigations of crimes against defenders. Most notably, the directive sets out that investigations should start with the hypothesis that the crime was committed because of the defence of human rights. Furthermore, the directive encourages the accumulation and association of cases and reminds prosecutors, when formulating charges, to make use of the aggravating circumstances foreseen in the law for certain crimes, when the victims are defenders. Before that, prosecutors had largely ignored these aggravations and often not recognized defenders, attributing violence against them to ordinary criminality and not to their activism (Interview with analyst of the Attorney General’s Office, January 2019). While the Directive has helped to raise awareness of the problem among prosecutors and investigators, a lack of understanding of the role of defenders persists, in particular in rural areas, and there are still cases of stigmatization as guerilleros or terrorists (Interviews with prosecutor and defender, January 2019).

The methodological innovations in the investigations of homicides of defenders and the creation of specialized police and prosecution units to prioritize and support these investigations have resulted in advances in the clarification of these crimes: of the 365 homicides of defenders verified by the UN between 2016 and 2019, 54, that is, almost 15 per cent, had resulted in a sentence by 2020. In addition, 71 (19 per cent) had reached the trial stage, while 64 (18 per cent) had resulted in imputations or detention orders. However, it must also be noted that 48 per cent of the cases were still at the stage of a preliminary investigation, without identification of the presumed perpetrators (Fiscalía General de la Nación 2020). In addition, the criminal justice system continues to be weak in investigating the support networks of armed groups and their role in post-war violence, including in the public and private sector. And it is also weak in clarifying threats (letters, phone calls etc.) against defenders, despite the creation of a working group to support and coordinate their investigation within the Attorney General’s Office (Resolution 00339/2018, Wesche 2019). According to civil society organizations, 1,172 investigations of threats were registered with the Attorney General’s Office in 2017 and 2018, out of which only three resulted in a sentence (IAHCR 2019). This is a major gap in the Colombian protection regime, given that threats hinder defenders from fulfilling their role. Their investigation constitutes perhaps the most effective way by which the criminal justice system can contribute to preventing post-war violence. Overall, there have been important advances in investigating homicides of defenders. However it is questionable whether these advances will suffice to offset the structural justice obstacles defenders face in conflict-affected regions. Moreover, it is important to recognize the limited reach of the criminal justice system in dismantling the organizations responsible for attacks against defenders in contexts of poverty and widespread social and economic rights violations:

We can capture the first in command, the second, the third. The criminals see it as an opportunity. We fight every day, but there will always be someone wanting that position. In an armed group with hundreds of men, there will always be someone behind. To solve this, we need education, good salaries, development. Something that allows people to stay away from crime. We have many decrees in protection. But in Córdoba alone, there are an estimated 900,000 leaders. And we have 5,400 policemen. I don’t have to tell you anything more than that. (Interview with police officer, January 2019)

5. Conclusion: towards an integral approach of protecting defenders in transitions from armed conflict

In recent years, Colombia has been one of the most severely affected countries by post-war violence against defenders. Between 2017 and 2019, that is, after the peace agreement with FARC-EP, every three and a half days a defender was murdered, according to more conservative estimates (Cuerpo Élite de la Policía Nacional 2020). This increase in violence has occurred not despite, but because of the peace process, given that the state has been unable to stabilize the territories previously controlled by the rebels, where other and newly formed groups have entered and violently compete over war economies. In these territories, they threaten and kill defenders and in particular community leaders, when they decline to cooperate in controlling the local communities and economies or when they are perceived to cooperate with the state or competing armed groups. As such, violence against defenders is a systemic outcome of the country’s current post-conflict dynamic.

At the same time, Colombia has built an extensive protection regime for defenders. For many years, this regime focused on the provision of physical security measures to individuals at risk—an approach that has proven insufficient to address widespread violence against defenders in the Colombian transition. More recently and driven by civil society, the country has amended its protection approach. While continuing to provide security measures to defenders at risk, which constitutes a necessary component of any protection regime, it has started to give more emphasis to collective security arrangements. These arrangements go beyond individual defenders, targeting communities and organizations, and also beyond the traditional toolbox of providing bodyguards, vehicles, vests or temporary relocations. Here, the country has recognized the importance of coordinating security arrangements with their beneficiaries and of being more flexible with respect to the nature of these arrangements, according to their needs. In addition, the state recognizes the differential needs of the beneficiaries based on their age, ethnicity, gender and sexuality, among other criteria.

Furthermore, Colombia has strengthened the prevention of post-war violence against defenders. While stigmatization by public officials continues to be a problem, the country has adopted a policy of destigmatizing defenders, primarily through public events and campaigns with high-level officials acknowledging their work. Furthermore, the state has realized that effectively preventing post-war violence implies strengthening the capacities of communities in defending their rights, including in organization-building, communication, rights awareness, enforcement and in interacting with state authorities. In both prevention and protection, Colombia acknowledges that the participation of civil society and local authorities in the design and implementation of the respective measures is key to ensure their effectiveness: a functioning protection regime must be decentralized. It must involve strong coordination mechanisms between local governors, mayors, military, police, prosecutors, protection agencies and civil society. The international community and state entities responsible for human rights protection should accompany these mechanisms.

Moreover, against a background of rampant impunity, Colombia has taken steps to strengthen the capacity of the criminal justice system to investigate, prosecute and punish perpetrators of post-war violence against defenders, including those who order or approve these crimes. These steps consist of the creation of support structures to prioritize and concentrate the respective proceedings and in methodological improvements in the investigations. Regarding the latter, the criminal justice system has moved away from an approach of investigating each crime individually towards a policy of dismantling the armed groups responsible for attacking defenders. This policy focuses on principal perpetrators and is characterized by associations of cases and investigations in context that consider the patterns and structures of criminality. However, it must also be noted that these innovations in prevention, protection and accountability are relatively recent. Many find themselves at an early stage of implementation, which in some cases has been characterized by discontinuities. As such, they are still in the process of being translated from paper into practice.

Nonetheless, the Colombian case offers a valuable experience to learn from for other countries in transitions characterized by ongoing confrontations and reconfigurations of organized armed and criminal groups. In such contexts, post-war violence against defenders may evolve into a systematic and widespread phenomenon, which should be addressed in peace agreements through prevention, protection and accountability mechanisms. Otherwise, post-war violence against defenders, including those cooperating with the state in implementing peace agreements, may undermine the transition process. In addition, the Colombian case shows that physical security measures to individuals at risk and regular criminal investigations are insufficient to address post-war violence in such contexts. They may work well in relatively stable environments. But transitions from armed conflict involving continuing confrontations of armed groups and widespread post-war violence require a different approach.

Although it is difficult to assess the impact of the respective reforms in Colombia, given the early stage of implementation, they may serve as good practices for transition countries in similar circumstances. In addition to individual security measures, such countries should provide collective arrangements to communities and organizations based on continuous dialogue between providers and beneficiaries. These arrangements should not be limited to traditional protection measures such as vehicles and guards, but follow a more flexible approach depending on the differential needs of their beneficiaries. In prevention, transition countries should create alert and rapid response mechanisms at the local level, involving all relevant authorities and the participation of communities, who should be strengthened in their capacity to defend rights. With respect to accountability, transition countries should adopt a criminal policy that prioritizes crimes against defenders and focuses on dismantling the responsible groups. Such a collective approach may reduce crimes against defenders in post-conflict settings.

Yet, even the best protection framework will not completely prevent post-war violence against defenders without addressing its causes, at least where such violence is a symptom of structural grievances. In the Colombian transition, these consist in the continuing presence of organized armed and criminal groups competing over war economies in areas historically neglected by the state. In this case, a true prevention policy implies providing the young rural population in the territories most severely affected by the armed conflict with income opportunities apart from war economies. It implies increasing not only the presence of the military and the law enforcement agencies in these territories to effectively dismantle the armed groups, but also increasing the civil presence of the state, and facilitating access to basic public goods, such as water, electricity, infrastructure and healthcare. In other words, a true prevention policy in Colombia consists in a holistic implementation of the FARC-EP peace agreement, including its more transformative elements, such as its comprehensive rural reform.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

I thank Prof. Daniel Augenstein and Prof. Nicola Jägers of Tilburg University as well as Dr Claudia Zilla of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

Conflicts of interest

The author declares none.

Funding

The research has not been commissioned or funded by third parties.

References

Author notes