President Gustavo Petro denounced that criminal groups linked to drug trafficking in the department of Cauca have recruited 350 indigenous children, using them as human shields to avoid action by the authorities.
“If children take up arms, you cannot bomb. The children of Cauca become the shield of those armed against the State. There are 350 children recruited from indigenous groups: 350, that for me is a crime against humanity,” Petro said in his statement.
During the launch of the ‘Mission Cauca’ strategy in Popayán, the president stressed that “a child is not a combatant; He is a hostage, they have taken him, they make him do things. When he is one, he is a hostage. When there are several, it is a hostage taking.”
“And when it is all the time, it is a systematic hostage taking: Rome Statute, International Criminal Court, crime against humanity or crime against humanity. That is what is happening in Cauca and, by doing it systematically, it is a systematic taking of hostages,” the president stressed.
According to Petro, “that is what is happening in Cauca, in the rural population of Cauca, and it should be seen in popular neighborhoods of Popayán.”
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“They have taken it as the object of a crime against humanity, so that the State does not clash militarily against those in ‘business’. Those in business continue to get richer. With that they buy more weapons, they control more of the population, they move and do business, with the blood of the Caucano people,” he expressed.
“The drug trafficker is winning over the population. If the drug traffickers win over the population, the children take up arms“added the president, pointing out that one of the objectives of the Cauca Mission is to prevent this from happening.
President Petro’s complaint underlines the seriousness of the situation in Cauca and highlights the urgent need for state intervention to protect children and indigenous communities from crimes against humanity perpetrated by criminal groups.
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