2 headed by the Inter-Congregational Commission for Justice and Peace, submitted a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, according to which, since 1992, the members of the Meta Civic Committee of Human Rights have been subjected to threats, harassment and persecution, and that since that year there have been six executions, three disappearances and two persons have been forced to be internally displaced and seek asylum in the exterior. b) During 1995 the siege against the Meta Civic Committee of Human Rights by paramilitary groups which, through public events and telephone calls, threatened the human rights organizations present in the zone. c) In 1995 the petitioners presented various briefs before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to ratify the request for precautionary measures. On August 31, 1995, the petitioners stated in their brief that “[t]he situation of imminent danger against the lives of human rights defenders face has not changed at all; that to the contrary they are aware of events and circumstances, that made them fear that they should be prepared for an attack, directed at eliminating the President of the Committee, Doctor JOSUE GIRALDO CARDONA.” The request also pointed out that to date they had not received assured and effective answers regarding this situation by the Colombian State. d) In response to said threats, on November 22, 1995, the Inter-American Commission requested precautionary measures from the Colombian government on behalf of the members of the Civic Committee, including Mr. Josué Giraldo Cardona. The Colombian government responded to this request on January 5, 1996, stating that “[t]he Presidential Advisor for the Defense, Promotion and Protection of Human Rights...conducted inquiries at the highest level in order to provide protection to the members of the Comité.” It also stated that the Attorney General of the Nation had begun an investigation and that the National Police had coordinated some actions to provide security to the affected persons but that said security was suspended because the Committee temporarily ceased its work for the promotion of human rights. The government also stated that it had formed and Inter-Institutional Commission to diagnose the human rights situation in Meta. e) In January of 1996 the threats against the Committee intensified, motivating the President of the Civic Committee, Josué Giraldo Cardona, to temporarily abandon the country and the Board of Directors of the Civic Committee definitively close its headquarters. When Mr. Giraldo returned to the country, after participating in one of the sessions of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in 1996, the threats against him continued and supposedly “a paramilitary group installed itself in Villavicencio with the sole purpose of killing Josué Giraldo [Cardona]”. This event was repeatedly denounced to the Attorney General of the Nation without results. f) Despite the request for precautionary measures by the Commission to the State, on October 13, 1996, Josué Giraldo Cardona was murdered by shots fired from an unknown person in front of his home in the city of Villavicencio, while he played with his daughters, Sara and Natalia (these two witnessed the murder of their father), and in the presence of the North American citizen, Michael López. The killer, after the murder of Mr. Giraldo, left the scene on a motorcycle on the road that goes to the Municipality of Acacias where the headquarters of the Seventh Brigade of the Army is based. This base has been denounced by human rights groups for supporting paramilitary groups in the Meta Region. g) Currently, the wife of Josué Giraldo Cardona, Mariela de Giraldo, and their two daughters, Sara and Natalia, are terrified and run a grave risk of an attempt against their lives. The Commission states that in other similar cases “there also have been attempts against the family of the victims, as in the case of Luis Guillermo Pérez, whose family was harassed.” The other witness to the murder, the North American attorney Michael López, was forced to abandon the country given the situation. h) Similarly, on October 17, 1996, the petitioners requested that the Inter-American Commission, in accordance with Article 63(2) of the Convention, petition the Court to adopt provisional measures to protect the life and the physical integrity of Sister Noemy Palencia, Islena Rey Rodríguez, Gonzalo Zárate, Mariela de Giraldo and her two daughters Sara and Natalia Giraldo. 4. The Commission’s brief of October 22, 1996, in which it states that on that date case number 11.690 was opened before the Commission and that the November 22, 1995 precautionary measures requested by the