Colombia sentences 28 former fighters

They were convicted of acts including homicide and forced disappearances

AColombian court has sentenced 28 former paramilitary fighters to “alternative penalties” for acts committed from 1997 to 2006 that claimed some 6,000 victims, the public prosecutor’s office said Saturday.

The 28 were convicted of acts including homicide, forced disappearances and displacements, and genderbased violence, “in patterns of systematic, widespread and repeated criminality,” said a statement from the prosecutor’s office. This, it went on, was “part of an established directive aimed at violently gaining territory, regardless of the impact on the civilian population, especially of women, Afro-Colombians and indigenous people.”

The sentence was issued by a court in Medellin under the Justice and Peace system created in 2006 as part of the process of demobilising farright militias.

Justice and Peace provides for maximum sentences of eight years for former paramilitary fighters who confess to their crimes. The ruling requires demobilised fighters to make economic and symbolic reparations and “seek forgiveness” from the 6,069 victims and families.