UNHCR urges involvement of displaced victims in Colombian peace talks

The UN refugee agency UNHCR on Tuesday welcomed the decision to hold peace talks between the government of Colombia and the rebel National Liberation Army (ELN), and urged the sides to pay special attention to the rights of internally displaced people and refugees.

According to UNHCR, after Syria, Colombia's five-decade armed conflict has caused the world's second biggest number of displaced people.

UNHCR spokesperson Adrian Edwards on Tuesday said some 6.7 million people were displaced inside the country, around 13 percent of the entire population, and 360,000 officially recognized refugees had fled abroad.

The government of Colombia and the ELN on March 30 announced they would start formal peace talks in an effort to end more than half a century of fighting.

UNHCR's view is that victims should have access to the negotiating parties, as 60 victims did during the 1999-2002 Havana negotiations between the government and the rebels FARC.

The UNHCR spokesperson stressed a positive outcome to the negotiations would open the way for reintegration of the internally displaced and returning refugees, resulting over time in an improved human rights situation and in economic and social development in remote areas, including the country's borders.

Source: XINHUA