On the morning of Saturday, July 18, Garífuna leader Snider Centeno and other three members of the Triunfo de la Cruz community (plus one man from Belize) were kidnapped and disappeared by a group of men wearing bullet proof vests and uniforms of the Military Police and the Police Investigations Directorate (DPI). Snider is the president of the elected community council in Triunfo de la Cruz. His community received a favorable sentence from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2015. The Honduran state, however, has still not respected the court's judgment. The kidnapping and disappearance of Snider and four others is another attack against the Garífuna community and their struggle to protect their ancestral lands and the rights of Afro-indigenous and indigenous people to live. Join us to demand a full investigation and action to save the lives these men: Milton Joel Martínez Álvarez, Suami Aparicio Mejía García, Gerardo Misael Trochez Calix, Alber Sentana Thomas, and Snider Centeno.

Lately, there has been an increase in insecurity across Colombia. And to add to the wound, the already wide gap of inequality continues to widen, primarily in sectors that have historically been discriminated against through policies that promote racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, and war. As part of our new campaign, #ModusOperandi, we want to explain why violence against human rights defenders is not a coincidence. More than 100 human rights defenders have been killed this year alone. These killings cannot even be counted as State negligence since the mechanisms to protect these leaders’ lives are non-existent. Instead, it is a structural dynamic aimed at privileging the interests of the most powerful at the cost of the lives of the impoverished. Join us in a liturgy for social leaders as we pray for those who are seeds* of hope and those who continue to resist the State’s violence. (*seeds: people who have been assassinated and buried as seeds and their struggle lives on)

Thank you to Tri-C’s Conflict Resolution and Peace Studies program for organizing this free online program. Consider how reparations could promote racial reconciliation, healing and justice in the United States. The discussion will be led by David Ragland, an educator and advocate for human rights and racial justice. He is the co-executive director and co-founder of the Truth Telling Project, which works to help people understand deep-seated racism. His presentation will look at how the nation must address the harms of its past in order to reach racial reconciliation and move forward. Education and discussion, he says, are key to transforming conflict into peace. Ragland will talk about what reparations might look like in the modern era. According to the United Nations, it involves five elements: restitution, rehabilitation, compensation, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition.

Monday, September 28 - 10am in Colombia, 11am (ET) in Washington D.C. Conversation CONVIDA20: "Colombia cries out for Life, Peace and Justice" Panelists: Diego Pérez and Omar Fernández Testimonies of Resistance Río Naya and Afavit Registrations at: bit.ly/pazcolombia20

Celebrating our 30th year as an organization, Illinois School of the Americas Watch (ILSOAW) and the SOA Watch Staff Collective invite you to join us for a virtual gathering on Sunday, September 27th at 2pm-3:30pm Eastern / 1pm-2:30pm Central / 11am-12:30pm Pacific. The afternoon event consists of music, conversation, and members of the SOA Watch Staff Collective will share more about our work to end US-led and backed state violence; dismantle Border Imperialism; and stand with communities in Latin America organizing against the militarization of their lands and lives under a neoliberal model that values profit over people and the environment. The event is bilingual (Spanish and English), and interpretation will be provided.

The increasing push for global militarization directly impacts billions of women and gender nonconforming folks around the world each day. These voices, experiences and perspectives are often silenced when approaching solutions to this crisis. Hear about how militarism is experienced and about the stories of resistance to violence from several communities accompanied by Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT). CPT and the InterReligious Task Force on Central America & Colombia (IRTF) are partnering to bring several powerful voices together for a live webinar conversation on anti-militarism.