10-year Anniversary Celebration

In the short time I have spent in the community, I have become accustomed to seeing members of the community on an everyday basis. I talk with them about their cacao harvest, when their next trip down to San Josesito will be, their health and how their children are. Sometimes people tell me their stories of what they have been through during the war, giving me one person´s perspective through which to see the community´s history of nonviolent resistance. Our awareness of this history in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds has brought me, to some extent, to Colombia to do this work.

During the international celebration of the 10th anniversary of the peace community, however, this history lived in a way which I have not seen before. The community came together and invited the participants to join them in remembering ten years full of both triumph and almost unimaginable loss and violence. They held a silent march through downtown Apartado, an eight mile walk from the community. On this march, each community member and some internationals carried small coffins with the name of one of the 178 community members that has been killed in the last ten years. They left these coffins at the foot of the Attorney General´s office in silent protest of the fact that every one of these murders has remained unpunished. The night before, they held a mass and candlelight vigil over these same coffins. On the return from the march, the 50 or so internationals and the other Colombians, together with the community members, mounted crosses along the road from San Jose to Apartado to mark places where community members had been killed.

Along with memorializing those that have died in this stuggle, the community celebrated what they have accomplaished and imagined what the future will hold. During the 5-day event, they talked about how they, together with 15 other communities who are committed to non-violent resistance to the armed conflict, will continue to build the “Universidad Campesina” which will focus on developing an educational model that liberates the children of these communities and sharing best practices around agricultural production, the possibilities of producing for the fair trade market, and marketing amongst other things. They had a workshop on better understanding the so-called “Justice and Peace” Law, which in fact guarantees that the vast majority of paramilitaries will never be punished for the human rights atrocities they have committed, and talked about the implications of this. And then the children danced in celebration of their culture, others played the anthem of the community, and we all ate the rich, wonderful food made in the community from crops they themselves had raised. And throughout, the community members talked, to the representatives from Colombian indigenous communities, to the Belgian government officials, to the international accompaniers, and to the other rural communities, about how to build on what they had already accomplished.

The team felt that we were privileged to be accompanying this event, and also to be part of the process of thinking through how we will continue to support the project of the Peace Community of San Jose de Apartado in the future.




Community Members in front of a school in San Jose de Apartado, the community which they had to leave in 2005 when a police post was established here. The
sheet they are holding says:
"The principles: The Community Freely commits to:
1) Participating in Community Work
2) Saying no to injustice and impunity
3) Not participating in the war directly or indirectly, nor carrying any weapons
4) Not giving any information to any armed actor

Anniversary of Peace Community

A week after Bush's visit, and things have settled down. I am off to the Peace Community to accompany their ten-year anniversary. A new teammate, Mayra Moreno, has arrived, and after exciting meetings in Medellin this week and in Bogota, where we met with youth organized to be consciencious objectors, we are happy to be in Apartadó.

Bush comes to Bogotá

Bush came to Colombia today for six hours to meet with embattled Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. In the midst of scandal over many Uribe political allies' involvement with paramilitary groups, who are accused of horrendous human rights violations, Bush met with Uribe to discuss the Free Trade Agreement pending in Congress and the "progress" that has been made under Plan Colombia.

Bogotanos, in return, took to the street. From Wednesday through today protests took place throughout the city against Bush's visit. This week has demonstrated to me the broad-based opposition to Bush's policies in Colombia, and also brought into sharp relief how a small number of violent (anti-Bush) protestors can undermine and endanger collective peaceful resistance. What perhaps you have already seen on the news are the images of protestors kicking, throwing things, etc. What I saw today were about 2,000 non-violent protestors, including kids with their mothers, a man who is about to lose his job at a telephone company because of neoliberalism, a 24-year old who talked to me about the natural and cultural richness of her country, and a high school teacher who objects to Uribe, Colombia's president, being put into power by paramilitary forces and the US, not by the pueblo - the people. There were also a 100 or so violent youth throwing rocks amidst the rest of the non-violent protestors. As a result, police dispersed the protest after less than two hours with tear gas, and then later water hoses. Here are some pictures of what I saw:



Bush out of all of the galaxy




















Do you know why he came? He came to "mess with" you






street theatre, enacting the misery that Bush causes in Colombia, following the tear gassing and dispersion of the march









Demon Bush, Assassin & Terrorist: Out! Out! Out! of our Colombia! We want to be free!














Bush out of Colombia and out of Latin America

Anti-Bush protests day 2

"Out of Colombia...Bush is a terrorist to liberty."

The protests picked up today, with at least 5 tanks, 300 police and 200 "hooded" students throwing rocks and small explosives at the police around the corner from my apartment. I live next to the National University, the largest and best university in the country and, I was informed, Latin America. After seeing a friend to the airport, I took the bus back only to find the road to my house closed and teargas spilling down the street. I know now why they call it tear gas...as I teared for a while at the fumes. There was no confusion today at what was being protested, as students chanted "resistence! down with imperialism," and American flags were burned in downtown Bogotá. Things reportedly will only continue to pick up until Sunday, when Bush arrives.

It is intense, and I would say inspiring to see so many students out protesting (though the rock-throwing is, well, the opposite of inspiring). The vast majority of students attending the rally were peaceful, and unlike some protests I've been to in the US, when I "interviewed" protest onlookers for this blog, all students at the National University, they all knew why they were there, and wanted to let me know: some excerpts:

- We are here protesting the TLC (the pending Free Trade Agreement with Colombia) becuase it will destroy our economy, use up our natural resources, and eliminate indigenous communities.


- We know that Plan Colombia is really a counter-insurgency plan more than having anything to do with helping our country out socially. The money goes to help the armed forces, who 1 year ago killed a student, Oscar Salas, in one of these demonstrations. We are indignant that Bush is coming to a place where he is just destroying society, which is what the US has always done here...

- Diana, 18, National University student studying law: We are against the policy of armed conquering that the US carries out in colombia, against the repression that is carried out here.

- Christian, 18, National University student studying law: This is also a protest against Uribe [Colombian president and close Bush ally], who is in the middle of selling this country, and worsening the existing inequality

Bush comes to Colombia

Well, today was a nice and normal day in the office. I woke up early and finished a translation about how the Free Trade Agreement, or TLC by its Spanish acronym, would hurt the working standards and environment of Colombia. Then I finished some notes about the meetings we had been in last week, and then I went to lunch with a friend. On the way back from lunch, I noticed there were students lining my street, tanks in front of the entrance to the National University, which is the largest university in the country and also around the corner from my house, and that people all had their faces covered because they were running away from tear gas. Hmmm...not normal to me, I noted, but after speaking with several people, who looked amazingly unperturbed at what was happening, they assured me that this was nothing; that it was a relatively small, tranquilo protest.

See, the 50-or-so students, all wearing hoods to cover their faces from the tear gas but also to hide their identities, were mainly throwing rocks, not “papas,” or potatoes, homemade small bombs, and the riot police were using a high-powered hose and tear gas to control the student protesters, not live ammunition. There were no injuries reported on either side.

I then spent a surreal hour standing with the gathered students. Apart from sometimes lobbing more rocks and cement over the fence of the university so that the students inside the fence would have more ammo, they just looked on, occasionally running if the police came closer and threw tear gas our way, sometimes hooting to let the students know that the police were sneaking around the back of the tank to get nearer to them and throw tear gas grenades (not the technical term) at them. I asked a couple people what was going on, and the first answer I got was that tomorrow is International Women’s Day, and this was a...protest/celebration of that? Didn’t make sense to me either, so the next three people confirmed that this was in anticipation of President Bush’s Sunday visit.

This picture reads "The United States provides the money, Colombia provides the dead - No to Plan Colombia"

Bush will be in Colombia for about 6 hours this Sunday, and there are said to be at least 21,000 Colombian police preparing for his visit, which will entail army checkpoints and closing down some of the roads in Bogotá. There is a large protest planned in central Bogotá by the opposition political party. Colombians are particularly focused on opposing the Free Trade Agreement right now, as it will be voted on by Congress in the four months or so. Among other issues, like NAFTA and CAFTA (the Central American version), the Free Trade Agreement with Colombia would make small farmers unable to compete with US agrobusinesses, make medicine unaffordable to all but the very richest portion of society, and have the effect of futher concentrating wealth in the hands of the few. Here are some excerpts from our website which give some details of why it is so bad for

Farmers, indigenous people, Afro-Colombians...
*Agriculture is the third most important sector in terms of employment in Colombia, with 22.7% (almost double the figures for employment in the industrial sector, which generates 13.%), and provides 11.4% of GDP. Given that 12 years of NAFTA and the resulting flood of low-cost corn, wheat and beef imports from the U.S. that has been a major contributor to the displacement of 1.7 million small scale Mexican farmers, the potential negative impact on Colombian peasants, indigenous and Afro-Colombians is real. For example, significantly privileged under the agreement is Colombian palm oil -- the very same crop that is promoting violence and displacement among Afro-Colombian communities in the Chocó region. Since opening Colombia’s market to compete with the U.S. will actually lead to more human insecurity, U.S. trade policy in Colombia is inconsistent with the stated goals of the U.S. government’s drug war policy.

Human Rights... The picture below reads: Yankees out of Colombia, and out of the whole world! See, everyone hates the Yankees

* The U.S.-Colombia FTA lacks meaningful provisions to strengthen human rights protections. With regard to labor rights, the FTA only requires countries to effectively enforce their own labor laws, with no incentive to bring weak laws and enforcement up to the International Labor Organization (ILO) core labor standards. The enforcement and penalty mechanisms in the labor chapter of the U.S.-Colombia FTA are so weak that they provide no credible influence over the multinational corporations or Colombian government. Meanwhile, Colombia continues to be the most violent place in the world for trade unionists. According to the National Labor School (ENS) in Colombia, 70 trade unionists were murdered in 2005. Wages and working conditions in all countries will be hurt if trade pacts continue to encourage corporations to race to the bottom in workers’ rights.

People who think differently than Bush/Uribe...* In this picture, to the right of a crossed out Uncle Sam, President Bush is drawn with Colombian President Alvaro Urbe's head on his knee.



The conflict in Colombia is deeply rooted in economic, social, and political inequalities. Wealth and land remain concentrated in the hands of a few and Colombia’s political system neglects the needs of the majority of the population...Political and economic marginalization has already stoked widespread protests and political insecurity. However, dissent has been met with harsh repression. For example, on May 15, 2006 a national summit was called by Afro-Colombians and Indigenous leaders across fourteen provinces in Colombia to protest against the FTA and militarization. Tens of thousands of people who came out were met with severe repression, resulting in many deaths.




A Colombian eating a sandwich, taking in the protest and awaiting some movement by the riot police.