 I'm Carla Copel and I am vice president here with the US Institute of Peace and I always am happy when it is a Columbia Peace Forum because we get musical accompaniment which is a rare occurrence for our meetings. As I think most of you know but I will say the US Institute of Peace was created through an act of Congress during the period of President Reagan and is committed to the proposition that peace is possible, practical and cost effective. We work globally both with field programs on the ground and an extensive program of global research to look for the most effective strategies to prevent, resolve and rebuild following conflict and it's wonderful to be collaborating with the Washington office on Latin America and the Latin American working group in putting together this extraordinary program this morning. As I mentioned it's very little, you can stand back here. Part of the Columbia Peace Forum which was started by our dear colleague Ginny Bouvier in 2012 to really track progress with the peace process and to discuss challenges with implementation, negotiation and the carry forward. Of course in that period since 2012 a lot has changed and so today we're here to talk about implementation of an accord in its early stages of implementation I should say. I would be remiss if I didn't thank Jimena Sanchez and Lisa Hagaard for joining us today and putting on the presentation. It's great to have you both here for this discussion and I'm particularly honored to be introducing a panel with the 2017 winners of the Columbia National Prize for the Defense of Human Rights. So congratulations and it's our honor to host all of you here this morning. The prize itself is sponsored by Diakonia Swedish Humanitarian Agency and it's wonderful that they've brought the winners here to be with us this morning. They're here spending a week in Washington DC talking about both their work, this incredible mask which I hope you guys will talk about a little bit because it's amazing and beautiful and the path forward and I should say that for the U.S. Institute of Peace it's particularly timely to have the conversation today because just yesterday we hosted the European Union High Commissioner for Human Rights, Stavros Lembrunidis and in his discussion he really talked about the importance of civil society organizations in sustaining and maintaining peace and so this is an incredibly perfect follow-on to that general conversation about the work that he's doing around the world and so I'm excited to hear some of that conversation. Last but not least, thank you to Steve Hage and Tonus Montes for putting together the program and for moderating. Steve is a senior program officer here with the Institute and Moon Lights on Columbia so thank you for that and Tonus has been a stalwart supporter of our Columbia program for years so thanks again for putting this together and I look forward to listening to this incredibly rich conversation. Thank you very much Carla. Good morning to everyone. You all have I believe headsets. We're going to have the most of the conversation this morning in Spanish and that we can in that regard so thank you very much Carla for your warm introduction. Good morning to everyone that's here with us this morning on behalf of the United States Institute for Peace. It is very we are very grateful to host this Peace Forum on Columbia along with our partners from Wola and Log. We are taking this opportunity to share the inspirational examples of the winners of the Dakonia Human Rights Award in Columbia who are here with us today and who we are receiving very warmly and with much excitement understanding that Columbia is passing through a very important time with a lot of uncertainty but also understanding that there's a lot of resilience and hope. The continuation of the forums for peace in Columbia is very important for all of us who knew Ginny Bouvier our dear colleague who unfortunately left us last year. These forums constitute a tangible example of Ginny's legacy and an example of how her work keeps leaving the footprint of peace and changing the conditions of people of all of the folks affected by the armed conflict in Columbia. Over her long career Ginny as a peace builder Colombian human rights were very important to her just like all of us today Ginny would be very honored to have Enrique Angelica Ivan and Donia Socorro here with us today. As moderator this morning I don't intend to replace Ginny in this space but what I will do is to attempt to humbly moderate this exchange of experiences and hopes of our four guests of honor to ensure that Lisa and Jimena have the opportunity to formulate questions and highlight the most relevant aspects. Over many decades being a human rights defender in Columbia has been a critical vocation that has also been very dangerous monitoring, documenting, denouncing grave human rights violations such as murders, disappearances, threats, arbitrary detentions, massive displacements and forced recruitment is an essential labor for safeguarding human rights in any country at war. Communities and individuals regardless of political tendency who suffer from these acts depend on these human rights defenders to ensure that their pain not remain in the shadows and in forget and so that their institutions can have adequate responses to restore their dignity vis-a-vis their the vocation of being a human rights worker is what's important is to commit oneself to protecting others. Many times human rights defenders can attract the anger of perpetrators and can become themselves victims. In spite of the fact that since the beginning of the implementation of the peace accord signed between the Colombian government and the FARC there have been undoubtable improvements in security in certain parts of the country. Threats and selective assassinations of leaders, community leaders as well as ex-combatants have not halted. In fact they have increased. In Columbia there are many statistics but the ones I would like to share with you come from the Institute for the Development of Peace in the past that just published alarming figures about the 170 social leaders and human rights defenders killed in 2017 which represents an increase of 45 percent in comparison to the previous year. The departments of Cauca, Nariño, Antioquia, Valle del Cauca and Choco have been the most heavily hit. Those areas in which FARC guerrillas held territorial control are those areas affected by new armed actors and organized criminal groups. Neither the prosecutor general nor the government have not been able to systematize these assassinations unfortunately this has become attributed to isolated cases. All of this added to the long history of underappreciating and stigmatizing victims in Columbia. Also with the objective of minimizing risks the government has undertaken certain efforts to attend to this situation. First the national unit of protection has incorporated new members of to their teams from FARC ranks by means of decree 21-24 of 2017 there was a new way to respond to early alerts established which equally in December of last year the ministry of defense started a new security strategy which included deploying many members of the public force to affected municipalities. In January of 2018 the investigators from Indipas have reported 21 more cases of murders of human rights defenders and social leaders. Furthermore the expiration of January 9th of the temporary bilateral ceasefire with the ELN guerrillas has brought forth a new wave of violence that includes urban attacks such as the attack in Barranquilla on the 27th of January. Regarding the situation of security for former FARC combatants last week the prosecutor general recognized that in these rural areas that the FARC have been concentrated to lay down weapons there have been FARC members and family members murdered including members of the new FARC political party at least 50 of these people. Also members of the Centro Democrático Party have denounced situations of threats against candidates in the electoral period and I will ask Enrique Angelica Ivan and Donia Socorro to please enrich with their perspectives all of this information both as human rights defenders and as the spokespersons for people who are vulnerable to these types of attacks as well as from a more personal level as subjects who run the same risks as the people they defend. I would also like for them to understand the causes of violence in this historical moment that brings together the post agreement with the FARC and the electoral campaign for Congress scheduled for March 11th. I would also like to take advantage of this space so that our guests can share with us their analyses from a human rights perspective on various fundamental aspects of the current situation in Colombia such as the achievements and difficulties of implementing the FARC agreement, the work of the Special Jurisdictions for Peace and the Truth Commission which were recently established the challenges of humanitarian protection in conflict zones after following the breaking of the ceasefire between the ELN and the government and the implications of large migratory waves of Venezuelans towards Colombia. After Enrique Angelica Ivan and Donia Socorro speak I will invite our two commentators to ask some questions to enrich our conversation with their perspectives. Both are very well known by many of you in this audience. We have Jimena Sanchez with us the director of For the Andes of Forwola who has fought for many years to highlight the reality of the millions of displaced persons in Colombia and to recognize the rights of Afro-Columbian and indigenous communities. I would also like to introduce Lisa Haugert the executive director of the Latin American Working Group. For two decades she has led the promotion of human rights and peace issues in Latin America coordinating coalition campaigns, giving testimony various times to Congress and producing a wide variety of written works on human rights in Latin America. I had the great privilege of serving with both of them as a member of the jury of the Diaconia Human Rights Prize and I'm sure they would be in agreement with me when I say that it was not a simple task given that we had dozens of candidates who were more than deserving of this prize or these prizes. I would like to invite Cesar from Diaconia before presenting or introducing our award winners so that Cesar can say a few words on the origin and purpose of these human rights awards. Good morning. As Steve just said a moment ago human rights defenders in Colombia face many aggressions and situations that put their work and lives at risk but there is one type of aggression that has been going on for years that's especially significant and that has to do with the social and political delegitimization of defenders. These defenders have been accused of many things they've been accused of being anti-patriotic they've been accused of being human rights traffickers who carry out politics with human rights who are opposed to everything and have very few proposals they're always bothering they're always fingering the wound and have very few ideas and proposals. They've been called allies of the insurgency who try to trick public opinion. This is what they say when they're not saying even more insulting things about them. Within this context of social and political delegitimization we created the national prize for human rights in 2012 as an effort so that Colombian society can begin to think that these men and women that are here with us pride the prize winners that they make part of the solution to our problems they're not an additional problem and they can contribute to building peace in fact they've been building peace for years and with their support Colombian democracy can improve. The national prize for the defense of human rights in Colombia is granted by Diaconia and the Church of Sweden. We have a delegate of the Church of Sweden here with us and it's a pleasure for that they make part for us that they make part of this alliance. I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to also express our uh we would like to honor Ms. Ginny for her commitment to human rights in Colombia to thank USIP for their warm welcome today their solidarity with human rights defenders and to uh thank Log and Wola for their work and their support over the years to these causes and their work preparing the agenda for the prize winners and I would just like to finish by saying that the protagonists of this meeting are the colleagues we are colleagues we have here on the stage. There were 75 individuals and organizations nominated to this prize and there was an independent jury made up of Diaconia members and the Church of Sweden and the jury decided that these are the people that should be honored and they can explain their work in favor of human rights in peace much better than I can thank you very much for your presence this morning. Without more delay it's my honor to introduce the four winners of the national human rights prize granted by Diaconia in Colombia we will begin by age beginning with the winner in the category of recognizing a whole lifetime of work and this is Mrs. Socorro Aceros Bautista you all have some words about Ms. Socorro's life written down on paper there are some biographies of each prize winner in the hall before you enter the conference room but I will briefly read some important aspects of Ms. Socorro's life throughout her lifetime Ms. Socorro has dedicated decades of her life accompanying victims of paramilitaries in the Tame Arauca Department she was instrumental in the creation of the Association of Agricultural Producers and Marketers of Flora Amarillo where she was also the coordinator of the Health Committee of the Community Action Board of the Tame municipality. Ms. Socorro was displaced following her son's murder since the 1980s armed groups have persecuted and targeted her due to her work she participates in numerous justice impeachment initiatives and this has motivated victims to not remain silent and to continue their search for missing relatives. Ms. Socorro also accompanies the processes led by the indigenous people living on the banks of the Cravo River so that they can get ahead in terms of confronting their daily obstacles. I will give the floor to Ms. Socorro it's a huge honor to have you here with us today so that you can tell us about your point of view regarding the historical moment that Colombia is living. Thank you very much. Good morning to everyone. Hi my name is Socorro Acero Bautista I'm from the Arauca Department in Colombia in the Tame municipality. I was the winner for a lifetime of defensive work. Thank you to Diaconia and the Swedish church that gave me this prize for a lifetime of work. I am excuse me because I am a regional leader. I didn't have any schooling just up to third grade in a elementary school but what I did learn was to fight to fight for all human beings. When I was about 11 years old I had to be in charge of my family my mother and my I had to be mother mother my father because my mother had blood cancer and my father had tropical anemia so when I started working people started to meet me and to know me and I was a very busy person and when I want and I wanted to learn a lot of things and thanks to God I was able to become a in a medical brigade I participated in them my my grandmother was a midwife and she taught me when I was 13 years old she when I was 13 years old she taught me how to cut the umbilical cord you know what that is right so from there I turned into a midwife just along with my grandmother her name was Julia Rondon and she afterwards people started to know that I was a midwife and she wanted to take me to a hospital so I could start working there and I could learn earn my livelihood from mother and from my father and from my two younger brothers that we had but they didn't accept me there because I didn't have enough studies there was a gentleman who's a friend of ours I was then 18 years old and he told us to come to the Arakha department because that's where oil was and there was money there and I've always been a lover of money all my life but earning it in an honorable fashion I thought there I would get a job even doing whatever but nothing I couldn't there was nothing so I started doing the work that I had as a midwife and as I had some knowledge and I have knowledge about how to do healing because I was already trained to do a third degree trauma level in terms of cutting curing tendons and veins that was my knowledge and so when people had problems they came up to us and they gave me money also when people came who had molar problems or teeth problems and the people and they wouldn't take out their molars and they would they would say they didn't have anything to do with and one day a gentleman who had a bad molar problem said so why don't we do something and I said why don't we sterilize a a plier one of those ones that you take out screws and just want you take out my molar and I was like I don't know how to do that and he but he said you know you have practice because I was a friend of the of doctors and they had showed me this and so that's how I pulled out my first molar and I became a midwife nurse and a dentist so in this work I finished this work in 2004 when the paramilitary wave of paramilitaries came which started in 1999 and Tame and then went up in up to 2004 they came there and they finished everything off for us they killed my son they threatened me I finished here now I'm protected here because I'm all I'm with you here thank god and I have it all but at that time I had nothing I had to leave I had to hide had to leave Arauca towards Cucuta I don't know how it was in one of those in one of those coverage trucks they call them terremogina in Colombia and there I was able to get my other children out and we went to Cucuta and went then to Bucaramanga in the Santander department because I am a Santanderiana and there I started to sell empanadas potatoes coffee with milk but I was not able to cover the rent we would we would wake up at three in the morning to have the food ready to sell and my son was he would sell the papas the empanadas and the milk with coffee and I sold under underwear but what happened it was not a lot of sales I could do so one of my granddaughter said grandma why don't we go to the warehouses and we let's get some fabric so they can which can be used for blankets and we'll sell them and it was oh they were not blankets but rather for mosquito nets and but I realized I just had my my two daughters also they come over here because there are people who are um displaced their victims and the the people are asking them to put denounce to put denunciations but I had I was I was going to I went back to Thame and I went I went back like the mouse trying to hide from the cat going from corner to corner because I've been threatened they had pursued me and they had gotten me out of there and so then we started to work with the investigators with the investigating prosecutors and I took 200 or more uh did not complaints from people for who out of fear they didn't leave but I even with my fear I left and I went out and that's when we founded an association called prosperar and they named me as a leader for the air the float out of Amarillo area and they came to I went looking at all the displaced people victims and I started looking down I told them we should all start an association so we started this association and as the government always tells you well for victims there will be money there will be I don't know what we're gonna give them money we're gonna give them reparations I also said that to the same thing to people that's right so the association was formed with 180 members 160 members but as there wasn't there wasn't any money just work and so people started to to leave and so at the end we just had yeah 168 and the end we were helped with a project where we had two refrigerators and just a table to work on and a water tank and a motorcycle to carry food I was always at every meeting I would say help us with something look we're on unprotected people but you're always thinking that there's people who don't like that you working for victims you don't know at one time they'll come and they'll tell you and they'll shoot you you don't know about you don't know what will happen the paramilitaries are always threatening us they said they're gonna finish they're gonna finish off all the leaders and excuse the my bad words but they said they're gonna kill off all the informants who opened their the shithole informants and saying that we're going to that we have to stop complaining to the government so that's where we are thank goodness if I forgot a few things excuse me I don't know thanks to god and for the people who paid attention to me and I ask king for help so that you work with us so that our only TPS has helped us but we don't we have been only to do by ourselves everything else everything that else coming the region's very rich is plantains rice corn fish eggs everything we have all that but there we are because if we don't have any help from the governments to buy some land and to make a house we're in bad in in a bad straits because it's we have a lot of work to do well thank you I think appreciate dichonia and the swedish church and walla who are the ones who have invited us here and with here to my gentle this gentleman here and to all of you who are present here thank you and excuse me for anything that I might have tripped up on thank you very much miss socorro for that life testimony it makes total sense that you have won this recognition for a lifetime of of work for all your life of sacrifice and perseverance and not just for your family in your case but for the case of all members of your community facing those threats and those dangers and learning so much wisdom at the same time at one point I'm going to ask you to help me with one of my teeth that I have here hurting me maybe you can help me with that I will yes sir okay so now we're going to go on to our next winner our human rights winner for the defender of the year we have the privilege to invite Enrique Chimonja Coy who is the member of the Inter-Ecclesial Commission for Justice and Peace he is a human rights defender based in Buenaventura Valle del Cauca in 2015 his organization the Inter-Ecclesial Inter-Ecclesial Commission for Justice and Peace and CIJP was awarded Walla's Human Rights Award for its unwavering commitment to justice in the face of intimidation and violence among his other active among their other activities CIJP provides key accompaniment and legal representation for displaced victims and civilian communities living in areas of armed conflict Enrique has helped civilians create the humanitarian space in Puente Nayero an area in Buenaventura where that civilians designated free of armed groups and violence in 2014 CIJP played a leading role in advocating for the recommendations of victims and that they be integrated into the peace accords with the FARC and they're doing the same with the ELN process thank you very much Enrique for being here with us this morning and I'll pass the microphone to you good morning to everyone to kind of continue what what our doctor and matriarch Socorro Acero was saying I don't know if Carlos mentioned it but she of the of the 13 years when she was 13 years old she she's from 13 she's cut more than 3000 umbilical cords and more than 3000 births and and that was the most sacred act that you can do which is to help to bring life in or bring life into this world and in that way I think with all of you from your different places that you come from in the world we are trying to accompany and we're able to accompany perhaps the most painful birth and which understanding what our mothers tell us about birth which is the birth of a construction towards peace not just in Colombia but in all the world obviously this birth we are part of all of this from the wisdom and experience of our matriarchs our indigenous for descendant and campesino matriarchs as well as each one of your contributions from wherever you may be so first I would like to recognize each one of you because well I think that being here is an unwavering conviction that amongst all of us we can achieve the necessary reconciliation in Colombia and to put down the basis for a true peace and an inclusive peace with justice with social justice environmental justice and gender justice obviously we have come in here in a moment that is very hopeful as for Colombia as well as the world and at the same time it's very complex due to the current panorama Stephen already mentioned it in the introduction it's it's been more than 20 leaders killed just in 2018 and we've put up here this orange color with the word no sin olvido do not forget to keep them present here and we're putting up some names and we hope that you hold them in your hearts to remember in the case in in the case of Buenaventura our great leader for the of the civil strike in 2017 Mr. Temocliz Machado who was assassinated because of Temocliz Machado who is killed for something that still has not been resolved and that's why the violence is continuing and this is the issue of territory territorial interests and the non-recognition of the from the judiciary of who are the legitimate and real owners of the territory in Colombia so when for Temocliz we along with him we remember all the leaders in Colombia in December perhaps in from our webpage you know and from our communiques you may know about the very painful method of Herman Bedoya in Chocoio and of Mario Castaño these are the final last victims of a process of demanding restitution for the victims in the collective territories of Higuamiando and Curvarado on the border with Panama in the north of Chocoio and with these murders the resistance and that that has been from business and economic interests against the process the peace process and even after the FARC even after the FARC has left down the arms they are these interests are trying to push the afro descendants and campesinos off of their land so this is an emblematic case in which for which there's a lot of documentation and we have had to go to the inter-american commission to protect these communities and even the constitutional court in the the Colombian case has put forth seven rits regarding this territory and their true owners but still that judicial order has not been fulfilled because the state is not a fact a de facto state but it's a it's a de facto state um in line with the narco paramilitaries who are in line with the business interests and we must remind remember within those leaders last year in Buena Ventura a big principal leader was killed part of the the compass network in terms of emilsa manjoma along with her husband and they were taken out of their home and after having been tortured they were murdered in the same urban area which where there is a lot of commercial and economic interests currently in columbia due to its location on the pacific ocean and for being the main port in columbia which is Buena Ventura so so that orange color with the never forget is for the hundreds of thousands of people killed in columbia the people who have been disappeared in columbia and the leaders in columbia threatened for defending life and defending a territory and the green color also with the never forget has to do with the hundreds of crimes against our common home as the pope has said against the territory against mother earth due to the intervention especially of agro industry businesses mining companies or in the case of the pacific the uh expansion of a port to comply with the free trade agreements that have been signed over the past decades so there's an accumulation harm some irreparable that have been done to the territory but others that can be recovered from and what we need is for those responsible for these crimes against uh human life and nature recur to one of the mechanisms that victims and human rights defenders have created and which has been one of the greatest advances in terms of the signing of the peace accord with the FARC which is the special jurisdiction for peace as well as the truth commission we think this is part of the painful birth and uh that those who are in power don't want to recognize today we don't fear the judiciary we don't feel uh we don't fear sentences to prison we don't fear extradition first to countries like the united states the real fear in columbia is the fear of the truth because that means really learning about and looking at ourselves and taking responsibility and that goes much beyond the people that have lifted up arms the responsibility of guerrillas of paramilitaries and of the state is severe but beyond that we have people who have benefited from the violence in columbia especially businesses and companies so i would like for this to be a space where we can remind ourselves about the importance of the comprehensive system for truth justice and reparation and non repetition uh so that this truth commission not leave the doors open to impunity and so that uh civilians and victims can not be left out of this mechanism these are very emotional spaces where certain episodes are repeated episodes that have been very painful for us 35 years ago my father was disappeared and that's why point five of the agreement is so important for there and the unit for searching for the search of disappeared persons has been created this is a very important step because we have to restore this damage and have a dignified memory of these lives of these disappeared persons we know that there are more than 70 000 in columbia exactly 33 years ago in 1985 in columbia we were living through a very uh a similar moment it was the a peace process undertaken by president belisario betancourt's government it was a hopeful moment the columbian people supported this process and there was a political party that uh uh came about as a result of these agreements and negotiations it was the union patrotica or patriotic union party in my municipality in the south of the willa department we had the first massacre perpetrated on october 11th 1985 against this movement in this region in columbia and as you may well know the figure of people assassinated or disappeared for having said yes to the to building peace as a political exercise it's more than 6000 people victims that made part of the patriotic union political movement and who were murdered or disappeared and today it's been paid we've read a a painful figure about x combatants who make part of the new fark political party who have been murdered following the laying down of arms and the signing of the peace agreement this worries us all we need to prevent that the genocide against the patriotic union not be repeated now just against the people that laid down their weapons but also those who have for a long time been building real proposals for peace we've heard donia socorro here talk about how the issue of building peace in columbia doesn't start with conversations between the fark and the national government peace proposals in columbia have to do with historic struggles that have been going on for hundreds of years carried out by the indigenous and afro columbian communities who have been offering resolutions for ending the conflict and have made real proposals for creating dignified living conditions without having to turn to armed violence these are ancestral peaceful proposals that deeply respect mother earth and the universe from which we receive life and which have also served as an inspiration to help resolve armed conflicts so as a peace and justice commission we've had the opportunity to accompany and support processes especially in the choco department on the columbian pacific coast and now in buenaventura which have gathered together these ancestral practices and have been adjusted to international law especially international humanitarian law to construct in rural areas and now recently in buenaventura in urban areas proposals that really affirm humanitarian rights and make possible conditions where we can have a respect for life and permanence in these territories furthermore right now they should be made visible and supported by the international community and especially the national government regarding these figures that i'm sure you've heard mentioned i'm referring to the humanitarian zones in rural columbia and humanitarian spaces in urban areas these mechanisms joined together with proposals regarding agricultural and environmental issues education for peace and building peace universities which have all been proposed within the framework of having magistrates of the truth commission go around columbia to different parts so that this can be a first step towards this construction of an educational proposal in function of peace as a function of peace and not capitalist interests so there's a list of concrete initiatives that are being carried out in these different territories one of these is in buenaventura i hope that all of you can visit and then we can multiply these types of conversations to see how we can inspire people to continue with peace building thank you very much and rike for your words they're very inspiring and they have reminded us of the deep pain that you as victims have felt and experienced in your lives but also how this has been inspirational in that you defend others and also reminding us of one of the many causes of serious human rights violations which are economic interests at the territorial level and giving us an idea of some of the land initiatives that you have worked on from your inter ecclesial commission in choco and certain areas of buenaventura thank you very much we now i will now give the word to angelica or these she is the winner in the category of collective experience or process of the year angelica is representative of the suzuin yiu yiu organization please correct me if i'm mispronouncing it it's a yiu women's organization and the name is in the yiu language it was founded in 2006 as an alliance between local communities and yiu organizations in the guajira department the objective of the organization is to increase visibility of human and ethnic rights abuses committed in the guajira department angelica represents this group whose mandate includes creating consciousness about the difficulties faced by victims vis-a-vis the militarization of their territories thank you very much angelica i will give you the floor good morning my name is angelica or these i make part of the women's yiu force movement we won the prize granted by the church of sweden in dakonia the national human rights defense award for 2017 i think that we will always be short on time to talk about all of the experiences and suffering we've had in columbia this initiative was founded in 2016 in the middle of a wave of paramilitary violence at that time for saddam al-hidus yiu published a book called from the desert which narrates the paramilitary incursion into guajira talking about paramilitary demobilization and at the time the organization was facing threats women that made up the organization for the central head is what yiu has always been an alliance between communities and the women that serve as coordinators within the organization and what we have done is to tell victims that you have rights and we started counting the number of victims which was approximately 247 victims at that time unfortunately due to cultural issues there are many victims that are not registered in by the yiu because if you speak about a victim without her permission in cultural terms it's a serious offense so we started to work and pamphlets started appearing saying those crazy women over there we're going to kill them we're going to disappear them and there was a lot of harassment and persecution of women that made part of the organization and there were displaced women we also have women who are in exile one woman in exile who dared to write and more deeply narrate how the paramilitary system was operating she was a victim of paramilitary violence 17 members of her family were killed right now she is an exile in switzerland as another columbian immigrant she seems to be like any other immigrant because she has she has not followed the laws where if one is in exile you have to leave has to leave the country in exile carmen ramirez and i just want to comment on what enrique was saying and as antigenist people we always talk about how the first in our ethnic terrorist we always say that the first victim is always mother earth because all of the attacks and bloodshed in the territory we see how it's almost like a payment to the territory for all the irreversible damage that's been done so on the one hand there's the terrorist indigenous territory saying no more no more because it's in the ethnic territories where we have felt this wave of violence in columbia both indigenous and african columbian and peasant communities have had to suffer through displacements disappearances and murders of community members this is also to say that although in columbia president santos said that we're going to do the referendum referendum through a plebiscite and well you all know what happened with that plebiscite but the civil society was um wanting these peace courts to be signed so one day after the loss of this plebiscite this referendum the civil civil society went out to all the main plazas in columbia to say yes to peace not everything is going well one thing where the peace accords with the FARC and the other thing where the big main deficiencies that the santos government had and one was also the generation of hate coming from other sectors sadly the santos government never really stepped up to these peace accords there was misunderstandings from outside that in order to put end to the FARC as a groomed putting an end to the FARC as a group on the group would end the violence but as we see the violence is increasing there is a murders of social leaders and but there's also threats and displacement so we also see how the national army is doing it is attacking an indigenous community in choco and then later it says i'm sorry we we thought there was an eln troops these type of things cannot continue happening i think that we have suffered the worst part of the war in our territories and now we see how the we see the results of that referendum that we those of us who are victims of the war said yes and end to the conflict and so although there has not everything is good in columbia and and though some and though some of the attacks or the attacks of the FARC against the pipelines and the national army that is a hopeful thing that is good that's true we're very slow in the implementation still we're going at a turtle's pace but the fact that these guns have been silenced and these weapons have been silenced this is something that is hopeful i think from the indigenous movement and from the very same women we are the big peace builders the fact that we just alone generate life that is a symbol that is a sign of peace an act of peace so i think the alliances that we have started to do as the women's force why you force we have started to forge a Caribbean women's indigenous network to visualize all these problems which though we have it in the though they are happening in our territories are not known sadly we also have an internal indigenous system which is unknown to us and this is and in the meetings the last thing that talks about in our indigenous meetings is about women and when they talk about it the majority people have left or people are tired and want to leave so this is how unfortunately it is if society in general is discriminating against women in terms of earning the same salary that a man would if that happens among women who most know their rights and among a society that most knows their rights and are educated among indigenous women the situation is even more even worse we don't know our rights and that's why the why you women's movement has been trying to push forth other forms of being and women's wisdom every when we have cooperation well obviously the government has to come and help but when there are convenings right now a lot of the small organizations are forgotten and they only think about the bigger organizations while those of us who are suffering the threats are living in the territory that doesn't mean that these alliances are not productive or not have or have not been productive we in our territory have work with Kahar, Concinet and national organizations who have helped us and supported us in our territory just like we have the permanent at the witness for peace that does work in the territory they're making visits to see how the situation is in our territory and we weren't working with them and showing how we've been affected by mining also auto mining from London and they are making British citizens aware of their responsibility and being tied to the Serhon because Serhon has their base in London and in this way we have also worked with witness for peace for doing alliances in our territory and we're there's a constant monitoring of what's happening in our territory threats well we are working closely with several social leaders who are part of the women's yu movement but they are threats they are targets of repeated threats when we go to put the complaints to the governmental authorities or to extend or to diffuse these we we can't do it anymore there's a government that does not respond to these threats and we see for example in the case of yu women's movement it's born in the middle of threats it's been born in the middle of threats and there has been a lack of attention in terms of lack of attention in terms of protection of what's happening in yu territories right now the interior ministry has given us a project we did a project of well we went to a meeting with them and it was very difficult this relationship in the beginning right now the yu women's movement is unprotected does not get protection from the state last year there was a judgment against a paramilitary under the under the who was covered under the who's justice and peace law and recognized all the damage caused to our organization even in this way the government has has been unable to give us protection from the national national protection unit in december we after sometimes since 2012 we got in touch with the national protection unit and they told us that they said they were coming they were coming three four times after three or four months the result is nothing they we just want them to come to the territory to see if what is happening or not there is another issue of environmental issues in the territory and the the rerouting of our water source people who don't know the guajira our territory is semi desertic semi desert desert it's a little bit arid on the border with venezuela and the few sources of water that we have which are of good quality it's not drinkable but it's semi-sweet because the water is always a little bit salty sadly mining because of the serrjon corporation mines has damaged our water sources in 2014 and 15 in those two years we did a study of our different water sources that were disappearing and how many are being contaminated currently it was a study with indepas to talking about the water contamination and to examine the water that we have in three municipalities in our territory and along with a university in cartagena and a university in germany we want to continue doing this monitoring but the things in our territory are not so good in terms of air quality every day at midday there are vibrations as if it was a earthquake every day and that's from the dynamite that they put underground to get the coal out this coal that produces energy in a large part of europe on the other hand we have a presence in the territory of the eln we are also hoping that the there is a ceasefire and that the conversations continue between the government and the eln columbia deserves to live better and i think something that i saw on social media these days when we were there was a armed lockdown by the eln with burges blown up and cars burned and everything else but we see the double standard of columbians we see that they complain about about the about war but then they also complain about peace so that's where my question is for these people who complain about both things what is your proposal to get out of this impasse that we're in in columbia if we complain about the good things but then we also complain about the bad things this is a challenge to try to get the eln to sign a ceasefire we are in a very difficult stage in columbia right now because we are in pre-elections in the campaign time and so we've seen how hate messages have increased and been spread through social media in an open campaign from the right-wing media who manipulate media in the country and they're sending these messages against progressive candidates from the green party or from the leftist parties and we see how they are attacking them in the interviews that they do in a very very disrespectful way these this hate has been spread out through social media and the people are tweeting them out without actually informing themselves and one journalist was saying that in columbia people just dedicate themselves to sending things out but they don't have a critical analysis of what they're reading they just dedicate themselves to sending stuff out and it's all a lie on the other hand the the subject of venezuelans well and guajira is a border region just like cesare and the norte de santander aralca it's very difficult and it's difficult to see how the national press are trying or have created a stereotype of venezuelans which is they are aggressive and and they're coming to cause crime in columbia knowing that knowing what columbia is sadly that's a generalized opinion of people towards venezuelans which is a very indifferent it's very little solidarity so there's kids there's women with small children months or newborns who are months old or newborns who are sleeping in the street and sadly the this is the arrival of venezuelans into guajira and the institutions have their hands tied because they can't do much in terms of health in the guajira department reported that in terms of attention medical attention to venezuelans in hospitals approximately nine million pesos have been spent in 2016 2017 and 2018 nine billion nine billion pesos and on the other hand the we're still warring the health secretary is doing a serve or monitoring in terms of about hiv and they're saying that with the with increase of and the entrance of venezuelan sex workers the person the hiv rate has also gone up this is complicating this there's a very floating population in guajira because of the boon that miss socorro was talking about because she said she heard that there was a lot of money in arauca there was a lot of petroleum a lot of oil and so when people come to our territory they realize that this question about there being a lot of money is not true la guajira is the second poorest department in columbia in 2017 in three years 5300 children have died from malnutrition or from illnesses related to malnutrition this has a lot to do with the bad quality of water that we are drinking because children might be eating well but if they have a poor drinking water water that's not drinkable it will cause or it does cause diarrhea as well as other intestinal infections that's our country that's what columbia is sadly right now we see the statistics that show that not everyone has the same statistics about human rights defenders in columbia but i think i think the closest one to correct is indipas where it's another or it's an organization that reports in around this time or in these two months in columbia they say that around 30 human rights defenders have been murdered in columbia according to indipas february february report the last three human rights defenders who were murdered were from the norte de santander one woman and two men in sorry it was in calca this is the landscape that we face as defenders these are all in terms of the special the special peace jurisdiction and the the unit of searching for disappeared people it's in the initial initial phases right now they are looking in the the truth commission and the civil society with the netherlands embassy has been has been going around collecting reports from the territory from civil society groups to to know how the truth commission can operate how to get information because there has been a lot a lot has been spoken about this but nothing has been actually put down everything is kind of like just written on the peace accord saying that the human rights defenders will be protected but it's not saying how actually it will happen so it's not just that they say it but how they do it and this is where we are stuck in terms we are worried that the truth commission does not serve the special jurisdiction special peace jurisdiction so what is it for if it's not going to be it's not going to include this if it's not included in the special peace jurisdiction the ethnic and the ethnic the ethnic agreed which was the last one that was added in and it wasn't even a point in the agreement rather a footnote and we are worried about the free prior and consensual consultation in with territories it's not a consultation about law but it's more of a administrative process as if we were in their house and we were saying like hey we're here we're going to give you a couple they we're in their house and they're saying we're going to give you a couple of months to get out of out of their house sadly this is a reality that we are facing in our territory and everyone's saying well Colombia it's really come together but I think each one of us have to contribute to the construction of peace and we have to continue weaving a path so that we can live a total and absolute peace and there is a very big and absolute challenge thank you thank you very much Angelica Angelica especially for reminding us of the importance of making visible the most vulnerable victims who are many times Afro-Columbian and indigenous groups as well as women within those groups so I think the example of your association is very inspiring for many of us and thank you for reminding us that in spite of this increase in violence that victims seek continue to support the peace process and that you see these contradictions and incongruencies between on both sides regarding the the peace and war and the issues that you highlighted regarding prior consultation and the ethnic chapter are very important and I'm sure we could discuss the experiences in the Guajira and prior consultation all day we have 30 more minutes I don't want to leave us with too little time for questions and for Lisa and Jimena's presentation so I'd like to present our last winner Ivan Madero Vergil pardon me winner from the category of the experience a collective process of the ill he's part of the regional corporation for the defensive defensive human rights credos members may their membership is made up of civil society members in the Magdalena Mediareden founded in 1987 the corporation defends human rights democracy international humanitarian law it works with grassroots organizations and social movements so they strengthen peace and raise awareness of human rights violations in the past two years credos has boosted peace pedagogy so that locals better understand the contents of the peace agreement so they can monitor and advocate for its implementation thank you very much Ivan good morning to everyone I would like to thank Diaconia the Church of Sweden for this great opportunity that you are offering to human rights defense organizations and the defenders and to defenders of our territories it's a great opportunity to have such an important and fundamental prize as is the national prize for the defensive human rights so I've been a representative for credo those for the past five years we have one in this category of non-governmental experiences of human rights in the territory it has been an important prize that represents the 30 years of work done by credos in the Magdalena Mediareden especially in its epicenter barranca vermeja I would also like to recognize and thank Wola for this great opportunity and the Institute of Peace for hosting us this morning here and to all of you for listening to us and for being interested in the situation of human rights in our country credos represents a whole life of defending and promoting human rights in the Magdalena Medio region it's an organization comprised of men and women who are convinced that the defense of human rights is an important and inherent ingredient to the construction of peace we can't talk about peace without talking about human rights it their defense their promotion and protection it's important a human rights defender in the region is a person who is convinced that we can't do this alone we can't get ahead alone we have to get together in different collective spaces to demand our rights rights that could generate spaces for social well-being it's an altruistic activity it's a resistance activity and many of us dare to do that to create these collectives and organizations so that we can be the voices of our communities that's why so many people are angry they feel impotent because of this great voice that we use to make public complaints they see us as an obstacle or a bother for their individual plans that's been 30 years of credos of having human rights defenders be assassinated displaced and persecuted for example David Crespo he was persecuted by the judicial system he was held in prison for seven years for a false case that was brought against him and that was one of three instances of judicial persecution of our members we still have members in exile we have a representative fedias who continues to live outside of the country they left in 1998 corralled almost by paramilitaries they could no longer withstand the persecution done by intelligence organizations another some of us who have left for a long time have come back convinced that this is the time for peace and while they want to make this difficult we've come back for that to continue demanding human rights and to build the peace that we've dreamed so much of and so we're excited to come back because Osiris who lives on islam Margarita in Venezuela is dreaming and is excited to come back to Branca Bermeja at some moment my colleagues here have spoken in detail so i'm gonna not do that so much but i would like to state some important considerations i would like to quickly review some of the things that my colleagues here have said first the issue of guarantees and protection not just for human rights social leaders this transitional period that Colombia is living through is contradictory because today we are orphans we feel alone and lacking protection the community in general in the regions in Colombia and Magdalena Medio is a special case human rights defenders were social leaders peasants unionists and the ex-combatants that are currently living through a reincorporation process so these three sectors includes the entire population of Colombia which is lacking protection this process is contradictory this peace process is contradictory it doesn't fit within this narrative of peace because there have been some excellent great agreements reached between the government and the FARC and there have been there's been a dialogue initiated in Quito that's very important but today the lack of guarantees for the defense of human rights and the lack of guarantees of human rights for communities is in danger this affects the issue of implementation as well in 2015 in in january of 2015 during a planning session for that year we agreed we're going to work on two points in in the agreement one was political participation because we realized that there's a lot there's not very much included in the agreement for the urban areas so we wanted to see how we could take advantage of the agreements as a way to solve our social problematic but Quito also made an effort to work on the fifth point which is the integral commission for truth non-repetition because we think that victims are important and that's what we saw in the agreement they were the central piece of the agreements but today the reality in the regions is different today we must work for all of the points agreed upon and that's how we have understood it over the past two years but we're worried about the system we were hopeful and we thought that victims would play a active political role so that they could they could recur to the special jurisdiction for peace but it hasn't been that way we've seen how that fifth point has been torn apart today we are stigmatized as human rights defenders they say you can't be here but within the special jurisdiction of peace structure we still are not able to understand or see what the victim's participation will be it's not clear at what time victims can begin to participate also we also with this exclusion see what's going on with point number two which is also having to do with victims participating politically and there were different special spaces created through the agreements today we don't it's a big mess as we say down there today it's not clear whether or not they'll be approved also regarding point number three when we talk about guarantees we talk about armed actors it's inevitable and in Colombia we resolved the idea as well as in the international community that paramilitaries have disappeared it was Uribe's great achievement they focused on other strategies there's a new phase of paramilitarism in Colombia imposing their terror and control over the regions both in the rural areas and in the cities they are taking and disputing these territories and that's how we see the necessity of point three of the government complying with its promise to dismantle paramilitarism but not just to dismantle it militarily but also to dismantle it economically politically and socially and then we look again at the special jurisdiction for peace we see civilians and others who have been declared guilty and then they come and enter the armed conflict financing and supporting paramilitary groups so these are our worries in terms of victim participation and guarantees and point number four has to do with crop substitution the substitution of illicit crops we can't have a double morality and the government does when a voluntary substitution is approved and i don't have the figures in front of me but there are many many peasants who have grown coca who have agreed with this proposal in the regions 123,000 families according to our friend Enrique here who have registered and signed and affirmed that they will not plant coca again so what is Santos's government giving them a forced eradication stigmatization and judicial persecution of peasants tying them to drug trafficking that's a big worry because it generates generates distrust vis-a-vis the agreements several months ago a week after the unfortunate incidents in tumaco and the massacre carried out by the police and army there regarding forced eradication we were accompanying some peasants from some handlets of the south of Boliva of the Boliva department whose coca crops were also being forcibly eradicated and they said to us how is the government gonna come present some agreement to us and then they're gonna yank out the coca plants forcibly what's going to happen to us and it can't be that first they substitute and then they get the subsidy and then there's the project it all has to happen in a parallel manner because that's how the peasants earn their living the campesinos live that off of that and columbia invests in highways to benefit all transportation companies the main highways and roads but the roads leading to small handlets and villages don't receive any investment not one peso and that's why the campesino or peasant decided to plant coca in the first place because yucca and plantains were not profitable because then the intermediaries would then raffle it off in every town and port it's important to reflect on this on the substitution of illicit crops because it's an international problem this uh just some observations in terms of the agreements in terms of the social crisis because there's also a relationship between a lack of knowledge of different rights environmental political social i'm referring to my region today in the magdalena medio region we are living through a very precarious social situation where people are drowning in poverty barranca bermeja is a port mainly for petroleum that has a multimodal port and is surrounded by six or seven mega projects there's a 40 percent unemployment right there there's an approximate 25 percent rate of absolute poverty today the workers who fight to maintain their jobs not for any sort of wage increase simply to maintain their jobs such as the workers in fertilizer in columbia the only public company in columbia that produces organic fertilizer and is important to the process hasn't received its employees haven't received their salaries in 10 months 50 employees have been laid off also talking about palm workers who are hired by intermediaries i'm gonna wrap up soon by third parties intermediary companies that don't recognize the stability of of employment and leave the family the worker and their families in precarious situations economically approximately a thousand workers for third parties from indu palm in bolivar are outsourced and they're demanding that the government eliminate cooperatives and that will result in extreme poverty it's this form of slavery that is being experienced in addition to all of the corruption today barranca bermeja is an orphan the mayor has been placed behind bars along with 10 other public officials that means that today's there's social humanitarian chaos in the magdalena medio region its capital barranca bermeja is facing a humanitarian crisis and just to conclude i would like to say that peace is built in the midst of war the armed conflict is currently enforced still and we have to make the columbian government commit itself to sit down with the ilan guerrillas again and and to dismantle paramilitaries because otherwise we can't have peace the columbian people are facing a situation of uncertainty and we said this yesterday at a meeting at walla we don't know if we should talk about peace or the armed conflict you can't build the peace in the midst of a war we have to have an ideal situation for this transition and reconciliation and to build trust but we must also say and i'm sure that you can deliver the message to the united states government that the embassy should have a commitment that's more territorial it has to decentralize its operations so that in terms of supporting peace in columbia they have to go to the different regions and learn firsthand and not just hear what the political class in columbia has to say that everything is in harmony because the fork signed some agreement but we also have to let the government know and the embassy through the embassy that they have to guarantee the security of these ex-fart combatants so that they may participate calmly in this electoral cycle we can't have an electoral cycle where people are killed and stigmatized uh because of the party they belong to we don't want to return to what we had with the patriotic union it was there was an extermination a genocide that the columbian government has not yet responded to it hasn't responded to any uh communications from the inter-american human rights commission regarding this genocide i would also like to say that we human rights defenders are remain committed but everything must be done in terms of solidarity and accompaniment with the international community you are key for the defense and protection and promotion of our rights but you're key for achieving peace in our territory that's why i invite you to come to all of the regions that we've named to the magdalena media to Buena Ventura to Arauca to La Guajira because there you will we are is really permanently continuing there and we're continuing to fight so that the government offers us an opportunity of social well-being i want to ask for a round of applause for all human rights defenders okay thank you so much Ivan for your your very important perspectives from the magdalena media region that you said was one of the most affected regions um and the work of credos has been fundamental for the protection of communities in that region i want to quickly offer the space to Jimena and Lisa to give a few comments so that we can sort of wrap up this morning's event Jimena if you want to good morning thank you very much first i want to thank the u.s institutes for peace and diaconia and the swedish church for this opportunity but also for this marvelous award that they give each year which is so important in colombia and i'm very honored to be a part of this effort which is really a legacy of jamie bouvie a person who was very who would be very happy with what we're that we're doing this today i have a few quick comments and then i have like 10 points that i think that we can do here in the united states to support based on what our colleagues here have said today okay first colombia has gone through some enormous changes in the last 16 months transformative changes which we we really have to must celebrate them we know that after the displacement of six million people and more than 220,000 people murdered more than 70,000 disappeared and thousands of kidnapped people and the quick acceleration of cultural extinction of hundreds of indigenous groups and attacks against the palanqueros and other communities finally a peace agreement was signed this is something that we must celebrate and that we must support at the same time you cannot forget the fact that there are some problems and we have to see how these problems can be corrected so we do not repeat this time period for colombia and also remember that here in the united states must the united states must think about and accept the responsibility that it has in the conflict in colombia which i would say is like the third part of this conflict the elephant that's not there but it actually is there in the room especially for all this because of all the military support it's given and the pressure that it's put on anti-drug laws which have not been effective and also not have only not been not effective but have been very harmful in many ways i also so i think that we must listen to these people who are here these people who really are the future of colombia they've always been the future of colombia but now i think they have the opportunity to really do what they want to do which is build democracy and to find nonviolent ways to heal the conflict that they bring with them very unique experiences of self-protection which really are not seen in other parts of the world based on international humanitarian law and there are they are examples of resistance of people displaced of victims of people who are in a situation who have been affected by all sides and are looking for self-protection to be able to live normally in the middle of a conflict there are also examples of the plural ethnic political and cultural diversity and the diverse the regional diversity that colombia has which is so important and which is its strength but as they said there have been in these months a significant deterioration in terms of security and really frankly a lack of capacity of the government to look to find a resolution a quick and effective resolution to these situations so i'm not going to say it again but this is security the dearticulation of other illegal armed groups the integration of ethnic territorial spaces and also to seek a solution to illegal illicit crops which would be a sustainable way and which would be done jointly with the communities that are forced or obliged to live off of this because they don't have any other options so what can we do here well many things first more than anything else we can insist that our department of state which is right next door and the senate guarantee that human rights conditions human rights be conditioned on or military support be conditioned on human rights and that part of that has to do with breaking the links between members of the armed forces and groups whether they be called new regrouped paramilitaries or backcream whatever they call the fact is that they're there the other thing is that we have a labor work plan between united states and columbia this action plan has as its prime point and this was done due to the pressure before the free trade was passed with the congress between our congress in columbia to do out to do away with outsourcing outsourcing basically takes away labor rights and puts an end to unionization and which is unionization and it has a very special focus in the palm oil sector in the port sector where two of our guests come from and in the mining sector where the third person comes from these are the areas where we must be putting pressure on because this is very problematic the other thing is the ethnic chapter of the agreements in this moment it had to be basically beat into the accords but it happened and it but it's something that must be respected and it must be strengthened from the international community we must prioritize the integration of ethnic rights especially the previous consultation in the implementation especially with the special jurisdictions for peace the very accord talks about respecting the simaron communities and the self-protection methods that these communities have used for years and during all the different conflicts with different governments and with the different armed actors and in in the many more manifestations in columbia and we also must guarantee that what our president said should be rejected this idea of rejecting economic aid and diplomacy and supporting human rights all those things that the us aid is doing in columbia yes it must get better and there are things that are still lacking but they are there to consolidate peace we cannot solve this problem militarily we cannot go back to what we did before which was a big mistake and now we have come to the point where we can find a different path and the other thing is the fourth part of the agreement on drugs you must allow it to work but to allow it to work does not mean just giving a time it has to be done well so the international community must see how what can be done to take off the obstacles so that this agree this accord um effectively goes into effect and so that it really happens efficiently i just have three more one is we must uh support the re um starting of dialogues with the eln it has been it has been a scar in the nation another scar the stopping has been a scar in another nation that doesn't need it and we must also talk about elevate the situation of human rights defenders and of other people who are trying to reincorporate into society it is absolutely necessary to make sure that this crisis is known in the world and finally we must support the supporting the peace process must means like it's very good what columbia has done with the peace process and it's not to diminish what they've done by talking about the problems and looking about solutions it's about saying like listen we're allies we're friends and and you would take this for your good and so this is what we must be saying from the united states thank you very much thank you very much himana and now we're going to hear from lisa for a few of her comments this award celebrates the great diversity strength creativity and the creativity of the human rights defender community in columbia we see a tremendous energy and persistence diverse ways of organizing you have seen today an emphasis on the work in network and the work of organizing communities and the processes and uh accompanying community processes there are really inspiring examples like such as creating humanitarian spaces there's different names for that but spaces where people with within the very conflict are creating out of their own efforts out of their own volunteer time peaceful efforts and telling the armed actors that no you can't do your stuff here you must understand that we do not want to be part of the conflict just like martin luther king or ghandi it's very important you've also seen the sense of humor and the emotion that the human rights defenders bring from columbia so all this is part of our work as as supporters and to support the tremendous work that human rights defenders do in columbia there's a part of this uh evaluation as jury that we that we have to do and i never want to do it again i want this to disappear and that is that we have to uh take into account the risk that each human rights defender runs i want to take that out of the list but we can't unfortunately and we need to continue focusing on the risk that they are running and that they should not be running the awardees have explained today and also himena mentioned many ways in which we really can defend the work of human rights defenders in columbia i'm going to mention three quickly the question of the dis the articulation of paramilitary and new paramilitary groups and groups and the people who have financed them the real importance of advancing in the implementation of the peace process and so that it is not in limbo also the importance of always investigating and processing the threats and attacks against human rights defenders i think that the columbian government the international community and all of us here have a lot of challenges yet to really be able to protect the people who are creating within their territories peace the peace that we all dream of thank you thank you very much lisa and himena for your comments and for these recommendations for all of us here in the united states and those of us who are interested and in solidarity with columbia we it's always happens to us that we go over time but whoever wants to stay maybe we have a time for maybe two questions from the audience i'm going to allow tony to choose and she has the microphone good morning my name is nubia garcia nuria garcia and i you all repeated that they have to continue and you have to do an effort to continue the process with the eln but however historically the peace processes have failed not just in the country but around the world with and many many other factors is the lack of political will by one of the by one of the parties i personally feel that the eln does not have political will to really go to the peace process that's what happened with the park in the seven other peace process that happened majority then do not have political will it was basically a game and one strategy for in their struggle that they had so i honestly think that we have to do a peace process with all armed groups that are in the country and that the dialogue is the way to do this is to end the conflict in the country but how can we do to implement it and to continue the negotiations when there really is no true will from one from one of the parties thank you very much we'll take one question i'm betris or dos firstly i thank you for being here you are a reason for pride for many people like myself it gives me a lot of satisfaction to see you here when enrique mentioned the 70 000 victims it reminded me of the 32 000 soldiers and the 40 000 police killed in this armed conflict i think it's also 32 000 mothers many orphan children and my question when we talk about the social environmental and gender justice maybe miss okuro might imagine what does it mean more to have more than a thousand abortions imposed on young girls and women who are who were recruited forcefully by the fork women girls stolen from their peasant partner we're talking about a talking about at least five human rights thank you very much one last brief comment thank you for being here and talking with us i wanted to ask you where you see a space for adolescents to take part in this process who would like to respond even it's a reality after such important agreements reached in havena and signed at the cologne theater political the political wills of the armed actors have to overcome i think that the columbian government has a serious commitment to end the armed conflict and today it's a great need and a responsibility for the columbian government to lay the foundations for this uh rapprochement with the eln we can't have this discourse that we have to wait for the other one to be willing we shouldn't open the door or the window if we don't leave the door open to these agreements in kito it's a step backwards that's why more than wills i think when you talk about needs because this is a process that's and the this is a process that that we must demand this willingness from armed groups respect international humanitarian law respect to law and to and to the property of civilians but it is up to the state up to the government to lay the foundations which are secure in order to build peace in the territories in this case in columbia that's why from the regions we are insisting and calling upon the government to reinitiate the dialogue in kito but we're also saying to the eln and we told this to the eln in barranca vermeja that this wasn't the time for armed lockdown of demonstrating their force because this is a different time now this is a different moment but we also have to recognize that the armed conflict has certain dynamics which must be understood so that we can show the columbian government that the war continues in our country just to answer the first question let's talk about the role of adolescence but i think we can't justify the continuation of violence maybe our analysis will lead us to believe that the eln does not want a peace agreement but but i think we also have to have some guarantees on the table i'm not justifying the eln but i'm also worried about the 50x fart combatants that have been assassinated but that's some that's something else but regarding the issues of mothers of victims yes there have been victims among peasants but we have to remember that the armed forces have victimized our communities by means of false positives for example who have abused and raped girls the case in arauca was tremendous there was a girl abused and raped by an officer he raped and murdered a girl and then killed her siblings so we know that there have been victims of the fark and the armed conflict we know that we're not going to give one another kisses in a war it's two different bands disputing power so yes unfortunately this practice of abortion within the armed groups we see that and we also see recruitment but the army has also recruited folks who are children and and from indigenous communities but that doesn't justify that young people be involved in the war and something we mentioned during the crafting of the peace agreement there's no justification for a child who was recruited by any group be it an illegal or legal group because we have to remember that before the armed forces would recruit minors until that was regulated in columbia we were saying that we don't think it's fair for a child who was recruited at eight nine twelve years old we don't think that after 18 they should be judged as someone who voluntarily joined the ranks of this group and also the issue of young people the young people were the sector of society that clamored most for these agreements with the fark they were the ones in the blaza bolivar demanding an agreement now agreement now so i think that the role of young people maybe it's not mentioned like this but the peace agreement includes the issue of youth people it's not uh an intersectorial part of it but it's included but i think it's fundamental to build peace hand in hand with young people because they're the next generation they're the ones that are going to be holding all of these different uh offices and playing the roles they're being played now by us of course of course the issue of that birth that we were talking about is something new it's so that we can overcome a great tragedy that thousands and thousands of us victims have lived through that's by the issue of truth in this case the issue of being a human rights defender doesn't let us define who are the victims of this state we all we celebrate that point five left as a fundamental pillar the complete clarification of truth and right now unfortunately it seems that the only ones who are going to pass through this system are the fark all of the other sectors that have to respond for their participation in the conflict have been left out due to budget cuts and things that have happened in the in congress so we have to know what the whole truth is that is a right that all columbians have so that we can build peace upon those foundations and we have to know the truth about what happened with the situation of members of the armed forces and the police and children and there's a lot of speculation we're also currently uh in the middle of a media war it's not just necessarily but i would like to wait to respond to that question until i see what the truth commission has to offer so that we can know deep down that right to truth and i would like to highlight this fundamental step that we've taken that we were able to achieve with the fark it was less because of the government's will and more because of the demands of the public that this process happened even though we didn't achieve more we think that it's a fundamental step towards the construction of peace however that's the way to resolve the armed conflict the challenge of peace is to resolve the structural causes that led to the conflict and those are still uh current so the proposals that we've made here have to do with that we want to build a culture of human rights so that this can be a reality in the world with regard to what the lady has said in terms of the abortions of so many children who lack protection and and children who have died i have a concrete case many young women when they become pregnant want to get rid of their kids because they want to remain single and i had a case with a young lady and as we say we saw her we saw that she was going to drink a certain remedy with two pills of aralen which is a malaria medication you know that i am a midwife and and i committed myself to raising the baby i told her i'm willing to raise the baby i have the baby the baby's 18 years old the baby is now studying and in 10th grade thanks to god and i thank god first and the prize because it has opened doors for me to go and speak with members of the office of the human rights ombudsman i spoke with them in cali and there was a secretary there i think her name was elizabeth but she said that from behind these desks we don't know what goes on in the regions so you all who are there why don't you help us to convince and organize all of the children and adolescents and the elderly why because we the elderly have experiences and adolescents just want to hear about i'm giving you 400 000 pesos and you're going to learn how to shoot a gun and so the young kids don't know what to do because many times their mother is working or is busy with other things and they don't they don't even teach them how to write from one to five or five to ten so that's a chapter that i would like to open in my area in my jurisdiction which is flora marillo from the tame municipality i have the land now i just need help with the construction materials because i have 80 adults over the age of 60 i have 56 55 adolescents between 12 and 17 and i have 47 children between the ages of five and nine but we need the office of the human rights ombudsman or someone to help us even if it's just with the cinder blocks we have the human resources to work because thanks to god i can hold a meeting and i know that the men and women will help me and once we have the materials to build this house and we can organize amongst ourselves so that's what i am asking for we are the ones that educate the children so that someone else doesn't come to take them away and and to affect our girls because i have a question for you what if i was a 14 or 17 year old girl and i came to ask you for a job and uh you asked me do you know how to sweep and i said no and you asked do you know how to make coffee and i said no and you asked do you know how to cook plantains and i said no what has been my education why is it like that because many times our mothers don't worry about us and if we go to school they won't teach us all that but if we have a home where we have the elders and the adolescents and the children between all of us we can build a community and we can create peace there because that's what we're going to learn is how to create peace an educated community that can get ahead where we can learn how to do many things thank you very much thank you very much miss socorro enrique and helica and evan thank you for your responses i want to thank all of you in the public um for waiting here until 12 30 today thank you for your interest and hopefully that you continue of being with us in future for uh around peace in columbia i want to especially thank maria antonia donis my colleague here for all of her um efforts to make this event possible two for her collaborators with himana and lisa and her their colleagues and obviously one one more final applause for our awardees and our winners of the national award thank you very much and have a good day hopefully you leave inspired by these examples