Forbidden voices: Torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment under drug policy in Bolivia

Background

An ignored sphere of state violence in Bolivia is the implementation of the
prohibitionist drug policy, which, among other legal norms, is expressed in Law 10082. Prisons are overcrowded with people who use drugs and those suffering from addiction or drug dependence, individuals who sell small quantities of substances to survive, and other low-level participants in the drug trade.

In the past decade, there have also been repeated cases of state persecution and imprisonment of coca leaf producers from a specific region of the country:
Los Yungas in the department of La Paz. People from the aforementioned social groups are those who suffer torture and other cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, both during police operations and in detention cells of investigative bodies, in prisons, and in so-called “rehabilitation centers.” These forms of violence also contain racist, class-based, and gender-discriminatory elements.

This state violence is invisible in Bolivia, and its surviving victims remain without justice, without treatment, and without reparation. The platform Acción Andina - Bolivia and the feminist coalition Programa Libertas, which monitor the impact of drug policy on human rights, present in this report the practices of torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, and the impunity that makes them possible, highlighting the voices of surviving victims. This report presents information gathered by Acción Andina - Bolivia and Programa Libertas over the past ten years through socio-legal research on the criminal prosecution of people who use drugs; from cases known and advised
during the same period; from judicial cases that were part of the strategic
litigation program and the diversion program6 of Acción Andina - Bolivia; and
through testimonies and life stories collected in different prior publications and
reports.

The information contained in this report was also presented by Acción Andina - Bolivia to the Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture (SPT), a United Nations body, in a meeting prior to the evaluation visit the SPT carried out in Bolivia in
December 2024.