United Nations condemns spike in Colombia 'massacres'

UN recorded 33 massacres this year alone

The UN peace mission in Colombia on Monday condemned a spiral of violence engulfing the country, saying it had documented 33 massacres so far this year.

The mission, set up to monitor adherence to a 2016 peace deal with the former FARC guerrillas, said it was investigating the deaths of 97 human rights defenders killed during the same period.

The violence was having a "serious humanitarian impact" in areas where illegal armed groups continued to operate, it said.

At least 13 people were killed in two separate incidents in the last week alone.

On Saturday, eight people were gunned down at a birthday party in Samaniego, in southwestern Narino department, police told AFP.

Narino borders Ecuador and is one of Colombia's main areas for growing coca leaves, the raw material for making cocaine.

Its strategic location makes it a favored route for smuggling drugs north to Central America and the US.

Meanwhile, authorities last Tuesday discovered the bodies of five Afro-Colombian teenagers in a sugar cane field near Cali.

Colombian and UN officials sounded a joint warning on Sunday about the deteriorating security situation in the country, despite a lockdown against the spread of the coronavirus in place since March 25.

Crime gangs are believed to be responsible for nearly 80 percent of massacres in Colombia this year, the vast majority of them occurring in departments with "illegal coca-producing enclaves," the UN human rights office said.

The UN has also recorded 41 murders of former FARC combatants in the first half of 2020, a 10 percent increase on the same period last year.

The UN defines a massacre as the killing of three or more people in the same event by the same group.