The national government declared an internal state of emergency after a meeting between the president Álvaro Uribe, the presidency’s legal secretary Mauricio González and the minister of interior Fabio Valencia Cossio, in order to deal with the crisis of the judicial strike that has been going on for more than 38 days. These emergency powers give the government extraordinary faculties to legislate, and have traditionally been called upon to deal with issues of law and order.
This extraordinary measure will last 90 days and was taken by the government on the impending possibility that many people who are being processed by the justice system might be declared not guilty because of the expiration of their trial terms. The authorities calculate that more than 2.700 people have been released because of the stop in the activities of judges and prosecutors all over the country. All other judiciary activities have also been at a standstill.