non-governmental Observatory on Human Rights and Displacement (CODHES) however estimates 4.9 million people to have been displaced in 2010. Intensification of political conflicts and the expansion of the conflicts into a vast majority of the Colombian territory have caused the numbers of displacement to increase significantly over the past years. Most vulnerable to displacement are women, children and ethnic minorities.
Context and causes of displacement Forced displacement in Colombia is the consequence of an internal armed conflict that has been going on for four decades. Most of the country’s regions, including the pacific and Caribbean costs, central Andes and the Amazon region have been affected. Parties involved directly in the conflict are mainly the government forces and rebel terrorist groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN). These two rebel groups alone are violently active in 24 of the 32 departments of the country.37 According to the specific properties of the land (in terms of richness of soil or natural resources), some areas are more relevant in the war conflict between guerillas and the government, reason why it is possible to map statistics of displacement in predominant areas as well as their direction of flow to attractor points.
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37 Ibanez, A. M.; Velez, C. E., 2003
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