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II. Recommendations

Humanitarian Assistance

The Social Solidarity Network should ensure that displaced families receive emergency humanitarian aid without delay to provide for their immediate needs while they are completing the formal process of registering as displaced persons.

Education

The Ministry of Education should ensure that all children enjoy their right to a free primary education, as guaranteed by international law.  In particular, it should work with appropriate enforcement officials to sanction schools that illegally levy matriculation fees, “voluntary” monthly assessments, or other fees, as well as those that turn away students who do not have identification, who lack uniforms, or who are older than the target age for their grades.  It should also work with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, and donor governments to identify ways to prevent indirect costs of schooling, such as the cost of school supplies and transport, from becoming a barrier to the enjoyment of the right to education, particularly for children who are internally displaced.

Health Needs

The Ministry of Health should ensure that hospitals and clinics are aware of their obligation to provide all persons with emergency care.  It should establish a referral and complaint mechanism to assist people in locating health facilities and in registering complaints, if necessary.  It should work with appropriate enforcement officials to sanction facilities that turn away people from the emergency care to which they are entitled as a matter of law.

Colombian authorities should take the following additional steps to ensure the right to the highest attainable standard of health:

• The government should extend the coverage of the subsidized health system to include medication, specialized consultations, and operations for persons who are internally displaced.
• The government should extend the period of humanitarian food aid beyond the usual three- or six-month period authorized by Law 387.
• Public health initiatives should include improved access to health information, including information on sexual and reproductive health.
• Public health initiatives should also include public awareness campaigns to inform displaced persons of the health care available to them and where they can go to receive the documentation necessary to receive it.

International donors should extend funding for health initiatives for displaced persons.

Returns to Home Communities

The government of Colombia should ensure that any returns of displaced persons to their home communities are voluntary and in conditions of safety and dignity.

Donor governments should stop funding government programs that encourage returns that are not voluntary and in conditions of safety and dignity, as required by international standards.  In particular, the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Internally Displaced Persons Program and the projects it funds should not support government initiatives that do not comply with international standards relating to returns.