Protesting Police Brutality

A poster for memorializing a student alleged killed by police nearby on Seventh Ave. in 2006,

A group of young people protested alleged police brutality this afternoon on Seventh Ave.

A plaque on Seventh Ave.
commemorates a youth
during a demonstration.

While police brutality has certainly occurred, I've also seen many examples of police being rather restained in the face of threatening and even violent protesters. (Protest scenes here, here and see what they did to the police here.) However, those incidents happened here in Bogotá, where lots of eyes are watching.

The protesters deserve respect and admiration. However, their focus on the official state forces also troubles me. Colombia's government has committed crimes - and acknowledged them. But, for the nation's left-wing guerrillas, commit crimes against humanity is often their modus operandi, and leftist groups turn a blind eye to that.

The government allowed this group to protest on Seventh Ave., just a few blocks from the capitol. That doesn't sound like a terrorist state to me.

Protesters making posters on Seventh Ave. They asked me to hide their faces. 

'The state is the terrorist.' Well, Colombia's government certainly has committed human rights crimes - and acknowledged them, at least sometimes, and paid compensation to victims. But the country's violent leftist guerrilla groups the FARC and ELN make violence their way of life, and almost never apologize for it. 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours