The Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) of Colombia denounced this Tuesday (06/25/2024) that some of its judges are being victims of alleged espionage and asked the Attorney General’s Office to open an investigation.
“Magistrates of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace have also expressed their suspicion of being the subject of alleged illegal interceptions,” detailed the director of Legal Affairs of the JEP, Jairo Arias, in a letter sent to the attorney general, Luz Adriana Camargo. .
The JEP considers “that if this situation were to be proven, its independence and autonomy would be affected” and furthermore “it would constitute a serious contradiction of the democratic principles that support the social and democratic State of law adopted by Colombia.”
“It is requested that the Attorney General’s Office and the competent judicial authorities investigate the facts and punish all those responsible; and consequently that the resources available to advance the investigative acts regarding the facts denounced by the Constitutional Court be extended to the facts that affect the judges of the JEP,” Arias added in the letter.
The new complaint comes days after magistrates of the Constitutional Court also testified before the Prosecutor’s Office about the alleged interception of their phones. The judges met with the attorney general to warn her of possible acts of espionage against her.
The Constitutional Court’s functions include examining whether the Government’s reforms, approved through laws or decrees, meet the requirements of constitutionality. According to Colombian media, the president of the Constitutional Court, José Fernando Reyes, gave the prosecutor a letter in which Judge Jorge Enrique Ibáñez denounces that he and his wife are “victims of persecution by state intelligence organizations.” .
Following this complaint, Camargo ordered to “initiate the corresponding investigation immediately”, to which is added the internal investigation announced on June 24 by the Administrative Department of the Presidency of the Republic (DAPRE).
“The national government does not intercept communications. This practice has been explicitly prohibited by the President of the Republic. State intelligence only investigates major criminals and we have been successful in that intelligence,” said President Gustavo Petro on the social network X on Tuesday. (before Twitter).
The president added: “If Judge Ibáñez has received wharsapps (sic) with that information, he is only a victim of extreme right groups that seek not only to break personal relations within the Government but also between the Government and the other branches of the State.” . We must “stop falling into the naiveties that Nazi groups construct,” Petro said.
Possible espionage of the Judiciary has already happened in the past, during the presidency of Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010), which led to a scandal with convictions of some of those responsible.
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