Crime in Colombia

rdf:langString Crime in Colombia

rdf:langString Colombia has a very high crime rate due to being a center for the cultivation and trafficking of cocaine. The Colombian conflict began in the mid-1960s and is a low-intensity asymmetric war between Colombian governments, paramilitary groups, crime syndicates, and left-wing guerrillas such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), and the National Liberation Army (ELN), fighting each other to increase their influence in Colombian territory. Two of the most important international actors that have contributed to the Colombian conflict are multinational companies and the United States. Elements of all the armed groups have been involved in drug trafficking. In a country where the presence of the state has always been weak, the result has been a grinding war on multiple fronts, with the civilian population caught in the crossfire and often deliberately targeted for "collaborating". Human rights advocates blame paramilitaries for massacres, "disappearances", and cases of torture and forced displacement. Rebel groups are behind assassinations, kidnapping and extortion. In 2011, President Juan Manuel Santos launched the "Borders for Prosperity" plan to fight poverty and combat violence from illegal armed groups along Colombia's borders through social and economic development. The plan received praise from the International Crisis Group. Colombia registered a homicide rate of 24.4 per 100,000 in 2016, the lowest since 1974. The 40-year low in murders came the same year that the government signed a peace agreement with the FARC. The murder rate further decreased to 22.6 in 2020, although still among the highest in the world, it decreased 73% from 84.2 in 1991. In the 1980s and 1990s it regularly ranked as number one in homicide rate. Since the beginning of the crisis in Bolivarian Venezuela and the mass emigration of Venezuelans during the Bolivarian diaspora, desperate Venezuelans have resorted to crime and have been recruited into gangs in order to survive. Venezuelan women have also resorted to prostitution in order to make a living in Colombia.