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Afro-Descendant & Indigenous: News & Updates

Event
La Lucha Sigue: The Struggle Continues. A film festival in honor of World Water Day, presented by SOA Watch
March 20, 2021 to March 21, 2021
SOA Watch presents a 2-day film festival as a celebration of World Water Day and the communities that put their lives on the line to defend it. Each film will be followed by a community specific panel with fierce Indigenous and Black women leaders. A large group discussion with all the women warriors together will close out the festival. Join us to hear directly from the visionary frontline leaders that are building a global movement to protect the earth, put health over wealth, and show people that another world is possible. Greed and destruction is not our destiny. Free: www.soaw.org
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Content Page
TAKE ACTION: Migrant Justice - Indigenous Peoples' Human Rights in Migration
March 16, 2021

President Biden has taken steps to address some urgent needs in the immigration system, but deportations and expulsions continue. Previous and current administrations have failed in their legal duty to protect the human rights of all migrants, particularly Indigenous peoples. The Biden administration needs to recognize, consult, and directly engage with the leadership of Indigenous and Black migrants.

Thank you NISGUA for the petition and image.

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RRN Letter
RRN Letter: Colombia, 3/13/2021
March 13, 2021
We wrote to officials in Colombia because of our concern for the safety of church leaders who are speaking out against armed violence. We are especially concerned that Bishop Ruben Dario Jaramillo, the bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Buenaventura, Valle del Cauca Department, is receiving death threats. The bishop told a radio journalist on March 3 that he received a death threat via WhatsApp and was warned he could become the victim of a bomb attack. We are concerned that paramilitary organizations are succeeding in seizing control over several districts of Buenaventura because the local security forces are complicit in allowing them to do so. The paramilitary groups are trying to impose their control in the city through fear, various extortionist tactics, and advertising what they call a “social cleansing” in the city. In the process, they are forcibly recruiting youth. The ongoing violence in Buenaventura is a clear example of how impunity for paramilitary actors threatens the true possibility of peace.
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RRN Letter
RRN Letter: Colombia, 3/12/2021
March 12, 2021
We urge protection for Wounan Phobur indigenous leader Ricardo Gonzáles Chirimia, a director of the Association of Communities Building Peace in Colombia (CONPAZCOL); he is being threatened in Buenaventura, Colombia. In 2003 paramilitaries forcibly displaced Ricardo Gonzáles Chirimia and his community from Bajo Calima village. In order to preserve their cultural identity, he and many of his indigenous community members temporarily settled in a small area designated by the Community Council del Bajo Calima. Since then they have been waiting for the national government’s Territory Renewal Agency (ART) to designate another site for definitive relocation. We are urging that (1) authorities investigate the threat received by Ricardo Gonzáles Chirimia, publish the results, and bring those responsible to justice; (2) the National Protection Unit activate preventative protection measures, in consultation with Ricardo Gonzáles Chirimia, and according to his wishes; and (3) the Territory Renewal Agency (ART) guarantee the definitive relocation of the Wounan Phobur indigenous community as soon as possible.
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RRN Letter
RRN Letter: Colombia, 3/11/2021
March 11, 2021
The Department of Antioquia was hardest hit by a wave of violence in February, due mostly to the predominance of the paramilitary group Clan del Golfo (Gulf Clan) in the region. Our letter to the president and attorney general of Colombia includes these incidents of horrific violence: a massacre of five farm workers, assassinations, threats to school teachers, and a 13-year old indigenous boy who lost his leg when he stepped on a landmine. We are urging that authorities in Colombia: (1) take all necessary steps to fully implement the 2016 Peace Accords, (2) immediately finalize the National Commission on Security Guarantees’ public policy for dismantling armed groups and their networks, and (3) strengthen the Special Investigation Unit to identify and prosecute both the material assailants and intellectual authors of attacks on human rights defenders and former combatants.
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News Article
Afro-Colombians Protest Violence and Government Neglect in Buenaventura
March 11, 2021

Criminal groups vying for control of illegal economies in Buenaventura, a port city on Colombia’s Pacific Coast, have long caused violence. In addition, the city’s majority Afro-Colombian population lacks access to necessities like clean water, decent jobs, and educational opportunities. Recently, residents have been raising awareness and calling for major policy changes to address both the current conflict and underlying issues.

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News Article
Colombia: Afro-Colombians Protest Violence and Government Neglect in Buenaventura
March 11, 2021

Criminal groups vying for control of illegal economies in Buenaventura, a port city on Colombia’s Pacific Coast, have long caused violence. In addition, the city’s majority Afro-Colombian population lacks access to necessities like clean water, decent jobs, and educational opportunities. Recently, residents have been raising awareness and calling for major policy changes to address both the current conflict and underlying issues. Over the last few weeks people have organized marches and protests to demand the attention and help they need. Young people have taken an especially active role in organizing, using the hashtag #SOSBuenaventura on social media to publicize their efforts.

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News Article
Colombia: Midwives Braving Armed Gangs
March 1, 2021
The Pacific port city of Buenaventura has a long history of violent conflict, which led to it being dubbed Colombia's "capital of horror". Since 1988, armed gangs have battled for territorial control of drug routes out of the port and carried out gruesome dismemberments in "casas de pique" (Spanish for chop houses). Buenaventura is now suffering a new wave of violence, and midwives like Feliciana Hurtado put themselves at risk by confronting armed fighters to help women living in violent areas deliver babies.
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News Article
Colombia: Insecurity Rising in Ethnic Communities
February 28, 2021
WOLA (Washington Office on Latin America) summarizes recent human rights cases in Colombia from the past several weeks including murders of social leaders, violence and threats towards Indigenous and Afro-Colombian elders and social leaders, violence of paramilitary towards individuals and in Indigenous territories, and continued fighting of paramilitary groups in Buenaventura, the large port city on the Pacific coast. The city’s majority Afro-Colombian population lacks access to necessities like clean water, decent jobs, and educational opportunities. Residents are calling for major policy changes to address both the current conflict and underlying issues.
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News Article
Colombia: UN Human Rights report shows rising violence and inequality
February 25, 2021
Widespread violence continued to impact Colombia’s most vulnerable and marginalised communities and social groups in 2020, according to the annual report on the country by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). The report also found alarming levels of inequality, with women badly affected, and lack of access to essential services, with some regions lacking clean water and medical care. In many instances, the Colombian state has failed to address security and humanitarian concerns, particularly in regions long impacted by conflict, structural poverty and historic state abandonment. The global pandemic also impacted on the human rights of the population. Among its recommendations, the OHCHR prioritised full implementation of the peace agreement in addressing the endemic violence which has claimed hundreds of lives since late 2016.
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