The year ended with violence continuing to impact social activists and their communities, as well as former FARC members in the peace process. This was despite the longrunning efforts to reduce violence through the Total Peace policy of seeking an end to conflict through dialogue and to advance implementation of the 2016 peace agreement, whose core elements tackle the roots of conflict.
Research by the Institute for Studies in Development and Peace (INDEPAZ), a Colombian human rights NGO, found that 171 social activists (nine of which were in December) and 31 former FARC guerrillas in the peace process (four in December) were murdered in 2024.
Here is JFC’s monthly update for December 2024 on the human rights situation in Colombia.
N.B. This article does not provide a definitive list of all human rights violations committed in Colombia. Various others are likely to have been committed during the period.
1 December – Colombia’s 70th massacre of 2024 left four people dead in Mercaderes, Cauca. The attack was carried out in a public establishment 100 metres from the Mayo River that marks Cauca’s border with the neighbouring Nariño department. The victims were identified as Robinson Uribe, Brayan León, Franki Ñañez and Jhon Obando. The last of these was a police officer currently on paternity leave. Armed groups have a major presence in both Cauca and Nariño.
2 December – Former FARC guerrilla Luis Armando Nene Orozco was murdered in Caldono, Cauca, where he was transitioning to civilian life under the terms of the 2016 peace agreement. Luis Armando was attacked in the market square of the Siberia district. According to INDEPAZ, he is the 28th former FARC member killed in 2024.
2 December – Four people were killed in an attack in San José de Guaviare, Guaviare department. According to the Corporación Amazonía Verde, an environmental organisation based in the area, at around 7.30pm armed paramilitaries opened fire against local residents, with the victims including an employee of the state-run Family Welfare Institute (ICBF) and a child. The four male victims were named as Fernando Pérez, Victor Manuel Vargas, Yofri Vásquez Medina and Anderson Murillo. A woman, Lised Vargas Ramírez, was injured in the attack.
5 December – Social activist Jhon Fredy Ramírez was killed in El Carmen de Viboral, Antioquia. He was a prominent organiser of community sports events, having helped coordinate the local marathon just days prior to his death. He was also a talented cyclist and footballer. Jhon was reported missing on the evening of 5 December and his body found the following morning.
10 December – Three members of the same family, a married couple and the husband’s father, were killed in San Juan de Betulia, Sucre. They were attacked while travelling along a rural road. It was the 72nd massacre of 2024.
12 December – Social leader Marcial Díaz was murdered in Curumaní, Cesar. He was shot dead outside his home.
13 December – Former FARC guerrilla José Lenoir Guerrero Tovar was murdered in La Montañita, department of Caquetá, close to the transition zone Agua Bonita were he was based under the terms of the 2016 peace agreement. He was also president of the JAC community council for the local district of Brisas del Suncillas. Armed assailants intercepted him as he travelled by motorbike. In 2022, a JFC delegation of politicians and trade unionists visited Agua Bonita to learn about residents’ experiences in the peace process, including the high levels of insecurity that former guerrillas are facing.
15 December – Three people were killed in Medellin, Colombia’s second city. They were attacked in the Manrique Central neighbourhood. Four armed assailants reportedly attacked a group of partygoers, with the three dead men named as Franklin Junior Abello Batista, who was 30 years old, 20-year-old Jhon Carlos Hernández García, both of whom were Venezuelan, and a Colombian 28-year-old, Juan Diego Valencia Rojas.
16 December – Former FARC member Camilo Segura López was killed in Vistahermosa, department of Meta. He had been based at the transitional zone Iconozco in the neighbouring Tolima department. According to INDEPAZ, he is the 30th former FARC member murdered in 2024.
18 December – Social activist Jaime Alexánder Betancur was killed in Valdivia, Antioquia. He belonged to the JAC community council for the district of La Coposa. Armed assailants reportedly forced him to enter a minefield to retrieve the bodies of dead fighters, setting off a blast that killed him.
18 December – Indigenous leader and activist Alexander Pilcué Tenorio was killed in Santander de Quilichao, Cauca. As well as an educator, Alexander served as a bodyguard to indigenous leader Rosalba Valesco, a senior official in the CRIC indigenous council of Cauca.
18 December – Three people were killed inside a clinic in Puerto Asís, department of Putumayo. A group of armed assailants dressed in medical uniforms reportedly entered the Alta Complejidad clinic and attacked two patients being treated there, as well as one other person. The victims were named as Edwin Cotasio Gaviria, Johan Contreras Bobadilla and Nediker Robledo Useche.
19 December – Human rights defender and lawyer Fabio Alex Ortega Acero was murdered in the city of Cúcuta, Norte de Santander.
21 December – Social leader Diego Tulande Acosta was killed in Buga, Valle del Cauca, where he was legal representative for the JAC Community Council in the Cerro Rico district. He also worked for local councillor Claudia Jaramillo.
22 December – Former FARC guerrilla Pedro Aníbal Sánchez Linares was found murdered in San Vicente del Caguán, Caquetá, where he was transitioning to civilian life under the terms of the 2016 peace agreement. His body was discovered days after armed assailants had abducted him from his home. INDEPAZ registered the killing as the 31st of a former FARC member in the peace process in 2024.
22 December – The Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC) condemned an attack on the family home of a local activist, when gunshots were fired at the property, in Toribío, Cauca.
24 December – Three people were killed in Balboa, Cauca, in the 75th massacre of 2024.
28 December – Cauca’s long-running wave of violence continued with the killing of social activist Joselito Acosta León in the municipality of Cajibío. Joselito belonged to the JAC Community Council in La Diana district. It came amid warnings from local residents that armed groups had been fighting for 36 hours uninterrupted.
29 December – In a particularly brutal attack, carried our around midday, armed assailants killed an entire family as they dined at a restaurant in Aguachica, Cesar. The victims were church pastor Marlon Yamith Lora, his wife Yurlay Rincón, and their children Angela Natalia Lora and Santiago Lora. They had attended Sunday service prior to the attack. Authorities were investigating whether armed groups in the zone were behind the killings.