"Despite the 2016 peace agreement, Colombia is witnessing increased numbers of displacement due to ongoing intense clashes… Group displacements increased in the first half of 2017 in Colombia. According to OCHA [the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs], displacement has increased with 20 per cent compared with the same period in 2016," the statement said.
The recent wave of violence escalated in July, forcing hundreds of people to displace in the Norte de Santander and Narino provinces, the NRC specified.
The NRC stressed that violence in Colombia was mainly triggered by the lack of opportunities and education, as well as poverty, prompting development of drug production, trafficking and continuation of the armed conflict.
FARC was formed in 1964 as the military wing of Colombia's Communist Party. The half-century war between the FARC and the Colombian government claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. Attempts by Bogota to negotiate a peace deal successfully ended in 2016, when a peace treaty was signed in November and then approved by the Colombian parliament in December.
