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Análisis Político

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SCHLENKER, Juana  and  ITURRALDE, Manuel A.. The use of the human rights discourse by Colombian illegal armed groups humanization of the armed conflict or strategy of war?. anal.polit. [online]. 2006, vol.19, n.56, pp.29-50. ISSN 0121-4705.

In Colombia human rights are normative principles recognized by all the illegal groups involved in the armed conflict; nevertheless, their violation has increased during the last decades. This article explores the way in which the FARC, the ELN and the AUC understand human rights and Humanitarian International Law and include them in their political discourse, showing the distance that exists between their discourse and their actions. Thus, human rights have become political weapons within the logic of war. The article takes into consideration the wider context of the Colombian armed conflict in order to understand the difficulty of moving from rhetoric to practice regarding human rights. Thus, the article tackles the construction of social relations, languages and identities that reproduce violence, favor exclusion and hinder the appropriation of human rights. The article concludes with a series of reflections about the possibility of regaining the transformative power of human rights within the Colombian context, so that they are no longer manipulated within the logic of war.

Keywords : Human rights; Colombian armed conflict; illegal armed actors; political discourse.


