53% more killings of social leaders in Colombia in last 4 months

The number of social leaders murdered in Colombia has increased by 53 percent in recent times.

Manuel Guillermo Marriaga Martinez was murdered while the curfew for the COVID-19 pandemic is still on in Colombia.

His murder was denounced by the Colombia's Social Independent Alliance (ASI). According to ASI, masked men approached and killed the 50-year-old political militant while he was riding his motorbike in Villa Matoso in the northern department of Cordoba.

Sixty-seven percent of these attacks targeting social leaders were committed by anonymous killers. Also, 21 former guerrilla soldiers were murdered.

"The government just denies this terrible reality, it stands undaunted in front of this painful and dangerous bleeding," Senator Ivan Cepeda said on Twitter.

So far, the number of social leaders murdered in Colombia has increased by 53 percent, most of them amidst the COVID-19 outbreak, as reported by the Ideas For Peace Foundation (FIP).