South America Log - No. 10

Dear Friends and Family,

We are back from our trip to Garzal where we enjoyed experiencing a rural Christmas. Click the picture below to see some of our photos from the trip:

Garzal

We were relieved that it was a quiet week given the communities concerns about increased violence during the holidays. Since we have only recently started working with this community, we spent much of our time visiting families to introduce ourselves and CPT, and to learn a little about their life and experiences.

We found many of the Christmas traditions to be familiar. Families were enjoying out of town guests. A common meal was prepared and shared by many families before going to Christmas Eve church services. Some families gave small gifts to their children. We enjoyed special foods that are usually only prepared at Christmas, including tamales and a spice cake baked over a wood fire. And, some in the community celebrated with drinking beer all through the night and into the next day.

A memorable part of our stay in Garzal was the Christmas Eve vigil at a small evangelical church in the community. (The pastor’s family was our main host for the week so our decision about whether to spend Christmas Eve with the church-goers or beer drinkers was clear.) The pastor, perhaps running short on music to keep the 4-hour vigil going until midnight asked us if we would sing a song. We agreed and sang ‘Joy to the World’ and ‘Silent Night’, explaining that in many churches in the US on Christmas Eve, the lights are extinguished and Silent Night is sung by candlelight. The pastor decided to end their vigil in the same way, so they passed out candles, turned off the generator, and we all sang ‘Noche de Paz’ at midnight. It made us both a little teary to enjoy a tradition from home and to think of many of you singing the same song that night.

We also enjoyed swimming in the Magdalena River, which is the color of chocolate milk, with our host’s family. And, on our last night with the family, we sat around joking and singing before going to bed. They asked us to sing for them and said they would sing for us in return. We sang Jingle Bells and then taught them the chorus. Several people caught on quite quickly while some of the grandchildren got the tune but used the typical “shwah, shwah” sounds to imitate the English words. I imagine we will still be hearing the grandchildren sing “Jingle shwah, Jingle shwah, Jingle shwah, shwah, shwah” to the tune of Jingle Bells when we return to their home.

While this Christmas was free from violence for the people of Garzal, our many conversations with families reminded us that the threats they are facing continue to be very real. Although many have farmed the land for 40 years, they are in the midst of a 6-year-long struggle to gain titles to their land, titles they have a right to under Colombian law. In the past few months the struggle has intensified with increased pressure from illegal armed groups for the families to abandon their farms. Fortunately, more human rights workers and a lawyer have joined with the community to work on their behalf. As we listened to the worry of so many farmers about the possibility of losing their land and their livelihood we were reminded of the words of a Colombian mother we met on our first visit to Colombia. She described peace as “going to bed at night with a roof over your head, food for your family, and freedom from fear”. We pray that 2008 will be the year the families of Garzal receive the titles to their land, and we all can rejoice with them in being just a little closer to Peace on Earth.

May you and your community have a roof over your head, food for your family and freedom from fear in 2008.

In Peace,

Michele and Nils

Bonus Christmas Song -

People who live in rural communities have access to an abundance of fresh food and are happy to share, but by the end of our time we were beginning to feel like we were in a food-themed ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’, which inspired the following:

Seven Days of Christmas in Garzal:

On the seventh day in Garzal, a neighbor gave to me

Seven cups of coffee

Six coconuts

Five kilos of oranges

Four cups of tamarind pulp

Three sour guavas

Two ripe bananas

And a chicken tamale wrapped in banana leaves!

CPT MISSION STATEMENT: Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) Colombia is a
community made up of trained volunteers from different cultures that forms part of the international, ecumenical organization, CPT. Our work is based in, though not limited to, the Middle Magdalena region of Colombia. We work together on grassroots initiatives to expose and transform structures of domination and oppression through active nonviolence in order to make possible a world grounded in respect, justice and love, even of enemies.

Read more or make a donation at www.cpt.org.

South America Log - No. 9

December 19, 2007

Dear Family and Friends:

The season of Advent is one of anticipation, as we look forward to celebrations together with family, and think about our hopes for the coming New Year. This year in Barrancabermeja we also wait in anticipation, or perhaps trepidation, for news from the community of Garzal. This pastoral farming community along the banks of the Magdalena River is named for the many herons and egrets (“garzas” in Spanish) that populate the riverbanks. There’s no electricity or running water in Garzal, but there’s a strong sense of community among the 136 families that live there; many of them have farmed this same land for 40 years.

The peaceful life of the families in Garzal is under threat. The community has been engaged in a decade-long bureaucratic process to register the titles to their land; they are legally entitled to the land under Colombian law due to their long residence. In recent years, members of the illegal paramilitaries have tried to take control of the land for drug trafficking or cattle-ranching. Most recently they have threatened to evict the community or make them sign over their land titles, by armed force if necessary. The community is particularly worried about the holiday season; they feel more alone over the Christmas and New Year's holiday when many government and human rights offices will be on vacation, allowing the illegal armed groups to move through their communities with few repercussions.

Michele and our teammate Rachel recently spent two days with the residents of Garzal as they met with Colombian government, United Nations and human rights organizations to develop a plan to fight for their land rights and to ask the government to fulfill their obligation to prevent displacement. As one leader of the community stated, “A farmer without land is like a fish without water.”

Displacement is not a new problem in Colombia or in the world. Displacement has been going on for decades in the area surrounding Barrancabermeja, and a recent report by the government Human Rights Defender's office indicates that displacement in the region has increased by 89% in the last year.

2000 years ago, after Jesus’ birth, instead of returning home, Mary and Joseph were forced to flee to Egypt with their newborn son:

When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt. (Matthew 2: 13-14)

Joseph, Mary and Jesus knew what it was like to live as displaced people, fleeing violence and leaving behind their family, friends, jobs and possessions in order to start a new life in a strange place that, hopefully, would offer safety. This experience of being displaced by violence is one shared by more than three million Colombians. Our hope is that the families of Garzal can avoid this fate and continue to farm the land they have peacefully lived on for generations.

This Christmas the two of us will experience a glimpse of the rural lifestyle that the families of Garzal are fighting for. In a few days, we will load up our backpacks and travel three hours by boat to Garzal to spend a week with the community. Unfortunately, we won't be able to call or respond to e-mails in the days around Christmas, although we will be in daily cell phone contact with our teammates. However, we are always glad when we get the opportunity to work together, and by the warm reception we've received in the past in Garzal, we are confident that spending Christmas with the families there will be a rich experience.

This Advent season please keep the people of Garzal in your prayers as they attempt to hold on to their homes and livelihood. And, may we all find small ways to build peace in our homes, communities and the world in the coming year.

Love and Peace,

Nils and Michele

P.S. We’ve put some more photos up on our blog – dancing salsa with our teammates, as well as pictures from our vacation to San Gil in November. Check them out at http://nilsandmichele.blogspot.com/

Salsa dancing!

I (Nils) am back from Nariño. My stay there ended up being just three weeks, but I had to turn right around for another five-day accompaniment almost as soon as I arrived back here. Now at last Michele and I have been able to spend some time together.

Click on the photo below for some pictures from a recent evening of dancing with some of our teammates at Las Cotorras, a favorite salsa bar. It was a supremely fun night, and a reminder that we need to get out more and enjoy Barrancabermeja’s nightlife.

Salsa Dancing

Update from Nils

Michele and I are spending a few weeks apart as I take part in an accompaniment in Nariño, in the far southwestern corner of Colombia, 30 hours from Barrancabermeja by bus. Nariño is beautiful, it’s very mountainous and also has a lot of rainforests. Right now I’m in Pasto, the capitol of Nariño, but we’ll mostly be working in the town of Ricaurte, about four hours from here. The newspaper ‘Diario del Sur’ has a bunch of photos of Ricuarte on their website (click here).

The photos do a pretty good job of telling the story of Ricaurte: beautiful mountainous rainforests, and lots of soldiers.

We’ll be in Ricaurte to accompany a community of Awá indigenous people that have been suffering in the armed conflict recently. Hundreds of families have had to flee their homes due to ongoing battles between the army and the FARC guerrilla, and many civilians have been killed, either caught in the crossfire or killed by landmines, which are prevalent in the rural areas. My teammate and I are not going to be visiting the rural areas for our own safety, but our accompaniment from Ricaurte can be helpful to the community leadership as they go about their work. We’re also hoping to write some articles to make the struggles of the Awá people more visible. I was here in Nariño last year in November, and it feels good to be back doing this valuable work.

Vacation in San Gil

We recently took a few days off team for a 4-day vacation in and near San Gil. Nils is leaving for an accompaniment in Nariño (the far southwestern corner of Colombia) so we wanted a vacation together before he left. San Gil is about 5 hours away from Barranca by bus, and the area around there is known for it's natural beauty, and it's beautiful colonial towns, as well as being a center for extreme sports such as whitewater rafting, hang gliding, and spelunking. We didn't do any extreme sports, but we did have a nice getaway, and went on some great hikes together.

In addition to San Gil, we visited the nearby village of Barichara, a beautifully-preserved colonial town. From there we hiked to a waterfall and to Guané, an even smaller village. Here are some pictures from our trip:

San Gil

Video about Small Miners on the web

The British non-profit organization War on Want has produced a short video about mining issues in southern Bolivar province in Colombia. This area is close to Barranacabermeja, and we do a lot of work in the region, including accompanying the miners federation mentioned in the video. Michele and I have met José Uribe, the man interviewed in the film, several times, and accompanied him at times when he felt his life was under threat.

The film does a good job of underlining the issues the small-scale miners are dealing with in the face of development interest by multinational mining companies.
Click here for the video.
It's worth watching.

South America Log - No. 8

Greetings Friends and Family,

After spending two months on vacation and giving presentations about Colombia in Minneapolis, we are writing once again from Barrancabermeja, Colombia. We returned to Barrancabermeja in September and we are excited to be spending another year here working with Christian Peacemaker Teams. (Your memory does serve you correctly if you thought we would only be here another 6 months – we made the decision over the summer to return for another year.)

We arrived to the news that the Colombian Army had begun a campaign of forced recruitment of young men to serve in the Army. Men are required to serve one year in the armed services unless they meet various conditions including being a student or caring for elderly parents. Legally, the Colombian Army can notify a young man that he is not in compliance with the law and order him to appear for his service. Instead, the Army has been driving around neighborhoods in a truck conducting sweeps, stopping every young man in sight and hauling him into the army base if he is not carrying a card verifying his military service.

One afternoon our teammate Pierre was walking when he saw two soldiers pointing at a young man on the sidewalk saying, "get that one there.". Coincidentally, Pierre knew the man, "Rafael", who is the 24-year-old leader of the local conscientious objector movement. Before being taken away, Rafael gave his cell phone number to Pierre and Pierre kept in contact with Rafael while he was detained. Rafael and the men detained with him were some of the lucky ones hauled off the street that day. As a conscientious objector, Rafael knows his rights regarding military service and he educated the other young men who were being detained with him. The Army realized they were worse off with Rafael in their detention area and they let him go the same day. But not before he had educated the other men that they had the right to refuse to sign any paperwork that day. The Army was unable to forcibly recruit anyone in Rafael's group.

A few days later Pierre and Michele met with the sergeant in charge of recruitment to express concerns about men being held, sometimes for days, without notification of their families and without the ability to fulfill work and family obligations. The sergeant admitted, "yes, it is irregular”, which is the official way to acknowledge that a practice violates their own standards without calling it “illegal” which would allow for action against them.

A recent CPT delegation from North America decided to design a public action to educate youth in Barranca about their rights regarding military service. The delegates constructed a large cardboard Army truck and painted it with the words, "NO to recruitment for the war, YES to recruitment for life."

The delegation and their Army truck walked through downtown Barranca passing out pamphlets notifying people of their rights under the recruitment laws. When they stopped in front of the Army battalion they enacted a scene of a person being forcibly recruited who then breaks away from the military to join a joyous celebration of life. Needless to say, this activity brought many soldiers out to the gate and the Commander watched for a few minutes before sending a soldier to get a video camera.

Rafael was with us that day and turned his head at first to avoid being filmed but then resumed his participation with his usual resolve to act on his convictions despite the potential consequences. For Rafael, who is an openly gay, conscientious objector in a city where paramilitaries regularly practice social cleansing by killing anyone they decide does not fit their ideal citizen, Rafael's every move is one of resolve. Instead of hiding in fear after the paramilitaries recently published a death list of young people involved in social movements, Rafael's participation in our recent public action conveys his unwavering determination.

When we gathered after the public action to share our thoughts and feelings about the day's activities Rafael was part of our circle. He tearfully talked about his need to continue to work for peace in honor of his many friends who have been killed in this 40 year old conflict. When we expressed concern that Rafael may be at greater risk now that the Army videotaped him, he told us not to worry and said, "when we do things from our heart then good things will come from them."

There is a saying here, "It is better to live in fear than to stop living because of fear." Every day Rafael and all Colombian peacemakers courageously choose to live and we are so honored to be able to continue for another year to share in peacemaking with them.

In Peace,

Michele and Nils

P.S. Four times per year delegations come to Colombia from North America to spend two weeks learning about the history and politics of Colombia, getting to know numerous human rights and peace organizations and visiting one of the rural areas where CPT works. To learn about future delegations go to www.cpt.org and click on “Delegations” on the left side of the page. We would love to host you and show you our work!

Back to Colombia

Hi Everyone,

After a lot of thought, we've decided to return to Colombia for a full year (not just 6 months as we previously discussed). We really love the work with CPT, and feel like our first year here we devoted a lot of energy to learning the context, and getting to know the people and organizations we work with; a second year will allow us to build on that experience, as well as continue to improve our Spanish.

Some of you have asked about our old fashioned snail mail address. You can send stuff to us at the following address:

Equipos Cristianos de Acción por la Paz
Apartado 280
Barrancabermeja, Santander, COLOMBIA

We've actually had pretty good luck receiving things in the mail from family, but I wouldn't advise sending anything too valuable or perishable.

We hope to resume our e-mail updates pretty soon.
Peace,
Nils & Michele

Back in Minnesota

After a fairly uneventful return trip, Michele and I are back in Minnesota. So far we've only been here a few days, but it's been great to see family and friends again and cathc up on what we've been missing out on. I hope we'll have a chance to see many of you before we return to Colombia in early September.

We're staying with Michele's parents until the end of July. The phone number here is (651) 633-4451. As of August 1st we'll be back in our house in Minneapolis, and back at our old phone number - (612) 822-6653.

We've arranged a number of presentations over the next few months to show our photos and talk about Colombia. Please let us know if you'd like to come to one and we can make sure you receive an invitation.

We're also still looking for a renter. If you know anyone who needs a short-term (probably September through March), furnished rental in Minneapolis, please have them call us or e-mail us (my address is nilsdybvig(at)yahoo.com)

Books about Colombia

A while ago my Dad was asking me about a book on Colombia, and I (Nils) realized that he might not be the only one interested in reading about Colombia. Here are some books about Colombia I've read or had recommended to me; if you have other suggestions let me know.

NONFICTION:
More Terrible than Death: Massacres, Drugs, and America's War in Colombia by Robin Kirk.
A good overview of the Colombian conflict, but because the focus is on political violence, I think it makes the conflict in Colombia seem more intensely violent than it really is. Mom, please don't read this book.

The Profits of Extermination: Big Mining in Colombia by Francisco Ramirez Cuellar.
Michele is reading this book, which uncovers the way foreign corporations have manipulated the law and worked hand in hand with right-wing death squads and the US and Colombian government to ensure profits at the cost of the rights and lives of workers, peasants and miners. Ramirez Cuellar is president of the Colombian mining union Sintraminercol, and has been a speaker for CPT past delegations.
This book is especially relevant to CPT's work in the Sur de Bolivar, where small-scale gold miners are being pressured to displace from their land at the same time that multinational mining companies are moving into the region.

Killing Pablo: the Hunt for Pablo Escobar by Mark Bowden.
This book charts the rise and fall of Colombian drugs baron Pablo Escobar, exposing the massive operation by covert US Special Forces and intelligence services to hunt down and assassinate him in 1993.

The Open Veins of Latin America: five centuries of the Pillage of a Continent by Eduardo Galeano
I am currently reading this analysis of the effects and causes of capitalist underdevelopment in Latin America. It was written in 1973, so it's a little dated, but Galeano is an engaging writer and an excellent analyst, and the dynamics of underdevelopment he describes are even more evident today. He's written some more recent books too, such as Upside Down (2001).

FICTION:
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez is considered one of this century's greatest authors (he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1982), and this tale of life in a small Colombian town is seen as his greatest work. How can you go wrong?

The Dark Bride by Laura Restrepo
Restrepo is one of Colombia's most acclaimed contemporary writers, and this book is set in the oilfields and slums of a fictional town modeled on Barrancabermeja, where we're living this year. I loved this one, and her other books are also supposed to be excellent.

Read one. Read them all. Propose them to your book club. Happy reading!

South America Log - No. 7

Dear friends and family,

We are just finishing up a 10 day trip visiting the Peace Sanctuary Churches we got to know when we first visited Colombia with a delegation in February 2006. The pastors of all 3 churches have also been guests in our home in Minneapolis so it's been a real blessing to get to connect again. Who could have guessed all the turns our life would take since that trip just 16 months ago.

We arrived in the first peace community after spending 13 hours traveling by bus from Barrancabermeja. Our hosts wanted us to visit one of their new development projects. We went by bicycle taxi to a small farm on the edge of town where several families are collectively raising chickens. We sat talking with a small group under a thatched roof porch as we waited for our lunch to finishing cooking over a small fire.

The talk made the usual twists and turns from weather and farming to politics, and specifically, US foreign policy in Colombia. Just two days earlier in the US House of Representatives, the foreign aid appropriations subcommittee had proposed a new approach to Bush's Plan Colombia by requesting a decrease in military aid to Colombia and an increase in development spending. The increased development aid will help the victims of the conflict, strengthen the judicial system, invest in rural development, and help farmers turn away from growing coca, the raw material for cocaine. We were surprised to discover that these small farmers in rural Colombia had already heard this news about a possible change in funding and they were feeling very encouraged.

This was the first of many similar conversations as we continued our trip. And, each time, the Colombians already knew of the proposed changes to Plan Colombia. Just maybe, we told each other, the advocacy we have been doing together is working.

These peace churches know the realities of the armed conflict in Colombia. One congregation was started by hundreds of families who were forced to flee their farms after the violence towards them became too great. Each church has members who have been disappeared or killed. The pastors themselves have been threatened. Just last year one of our hosts received a series of phone calls from an armed group demanding money and threatening him and his young family. His church responded with a round-the-clock vigil at his house until the threats subsided. In the midst of these realities these churches have resolutely proclaimed themselves peace sanctuaries and rejected any use of violence to end the conflict. Instead they have promoted economic development for their communities, alternatives to military service, and negotiated solutions in an effort to end the conflict.

After we said good-bye to one of our hosts we drove out of their town of 12,000 people in a taxi. Five army tanks and 15 soldiers lined the road. How, we wondered, will these tanks bring peace to this small farming community?

These conversations are a stark reminder of the direct impact that decisions made in Washington, DC are having on the people of Colombia, and the ongoing need to bring their stories back to the United States.

We are buoyed by the news from Washington that Plan Colombia may be facing significant changes. Still, there is much more work to do. A Free Trade Agreement with Colombia is still up for debate and all of our Colombian associates suggest that while this agreement will benefit the large landowners and big business of the US and Colombia, it will further worsen the economic crisis facing the majority of poor Colombians. This economic crisis fuels the conflict as young men join the illegal armed groups for lack of other economic opportunities, and farmers grow coca because the prices they receive for other crops won't support their families. Also, while positive changes to Plan Colombia have been proposed in the House, there is still a lot of work to do before the proposal becomes law. The full House is expected to vote on the foreign aid bill some time next week, so your calls to congress are needed. Visit http://www.lawg.org/countries/colombia/alert_06-07-07.htm for more information on how to call your congressperson and what to say.

Within our team in Barrancabermeja we still have much to learn and, we hope, more to contribute. For this, and so many reasons, we have decided to return to Colombia for another 6 months after spending the summer in Minneapolis. The most difficult part of this decision will be living far from friends and family for 6 more months, but it's the very support and encouragement we have received from so many of you that make it possible to return to Colombia.

We hope to see many of you this summer in Minneapolis. We also hope to arrange some presentations so please let us know if you have a group that is interested. After July 11 we can be reached at Michele's parents at 651-633-4451. The month of August we expect to be back at our house with our former phone number, 612-822-6653.

Finally, we have a house to rent! If you know anyone who needs a short-term (probably September through March), furnished rental in Minneapolis, please pass on our email addresses to them.

In Peace,
Michele and Nils

Trip to Chile, April 2007

In April we spent two weeks visiting Santiago and Southern Chile with our neighbors from Minneapolis, Lisa, who is on a sabbatical with her family, Sergio and Camilo.

Chile, April 2007

South America Log - No. 6

Greetings Friends and Family:

First, the good news: In our last newsletter we spoke about the disappearance of Katherine Gonzalez Torres. We rejoice that Katherine has been returned to her family, physically unhurt.

The other good news is that we leave in a few hours for a two-week vacation in Chile. Our friend and neighbor in Minneapolis, Lisa, has been on a sabbatical this past year with her partner's family in southern Chile. We are looking forward to seeing friends, exploring the ocean and mountains and drinking red wine.

Earlier this month we went together on an 11 day accompaniment to a small town called Mina Caribe in the Sur de Bolivar mining zone. To get to Mina Caribe, we took a bus for three hours, then a taxi, then traveled an hour by boat, then another taxi, then two hours by four-wheel-drive truck, and finally three more hours by mule. We accompanied a five-day leadership training school put on by the Sur de Bolivar Agro-Miners Federation, and then we stayed on in Mina Caribe for the Federation's General Assembly, which was attended by 100 miners and farmers representing 24 local associations. Participants were welcomed to the Assembly by a banner proclaiming, "Welcome Agro-mining Communities in Resistance." Unfortunately, just meeting for this lawful assembly became an act of resistance.

As the first miners began to gather for the assembly, 7 soldiers and their sergeant walked into town. The presence of the Army immediately increased the tension in the community. The Military has had an ongoing presence in the area for only the last year, so they know very little about the communities, and are suspicious of almost everyone. Detentions of community members are common and last September Alejandro Uribe, a mining federation leader, was killed by members of the Nueva Grenada battalion, the same battalion that was now occupying the town square. Community leaders fear that the army's harassment is part of a larger government strategy to remove them from their land so that foreign mining companies can take over the gold mining in the
region.

The Government Human Rights Ombudswoman had already arrived, anticipating interference by the military. The Ombudswoman and Michele and I introduced ourselves to the Sergeant and reminded him that military presence in civilian spaces is in direct violation to the Geneva Convention. The Sergeant defended his role there, saying his troops needed to protect the people. He repeatedly asked for the names of the event leadership. The Ombudswoman left to telephone the battalion's commanding officer to ask for the soldiers to be recalled.

One of the men with the Sergeant was a former resident of the town who was forced to move after being caught stealing. He is a civilian but he was dressed in an army uniform and carried a weapon that appeared to be a grenade launcher. He began to point out various members of the town, possibly to mark them as guerrilla supporters. Townspeople gathered around to denounce the use of the informant, calling him "the robber" and questioning his reliability.

Two hours after the soldiers arrived, several leaders assembled the community and asked us and other organizations accompanying the assembly to meet with the Sergeant and ask him to remove the informant from town. When the sergeant was called into the town square, he reported that in response to our phone calls his superiors had recalled his unit, and he angrily accused the residents of working behind his back. The Ombudswoman said she had requested his removal and that the Federation is a legally recognized organization holding legally sanctioned events. Several community members spoke up in protest of the use of the informant. Before the Sergeant left with his soldiers he took Michele and my names and identification numbers, as well as those of the other national and international accompaniers.

Shortly after the soldiers left, the miners began their Assembly, refusing to be deterred in their mission "For the right to a dignified life and permanence on the land."

Most of our time in Mina Caribe was quiet an uneventful, and I found myself feeling unnecessary. I found myself thinking "I wish I could be doing something more helpful." Then suddenly the military showed up, we were suddenly working at full-speed, and I found myself thinking, "I wish our help wasn't needed."

Given our experiences with human rights abuses by the Colombian military we were dismayed recently when Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice certified that Colombia had met the Human Rights criteria required for the release of $55 million in U.S. military aid. We were grateful when, a few days later, Senator Patrick Leahy, the chair of the Foreign Operations subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee, put a hold on the aid until the Senate could conduct its own Human Rights investigation. As we witness intimidation of community leaders by the military we are aware that as U.S. citizens we bear the responsibility for some of this problem since our government continues to fund the Colombian military at an alarming rate. In total, U.S. aid to Colombia was more than $700 million this year, over 80% of which goes to Colombian security forces. We are hopeful that ongoing pressure by human rights organizations and the organizing being done by CPT and other groups will continue to lead to
positive change in U.S. foreign policy towards Colombia. As we have been told many times by our Colombian partners, "more war will not give us less war."

Our friends often apologize in their e-mails, saying their lives sound boring in comparison to our monthly logs, but when they do write, their messages always fill me with hope: life continues on, people struggle with large and petty things, they play with their kids, they're sad and they're happy, they are OK. If my faith is what helps me do this work, more than anything it's my faith that life continues on like this.

Peace and Be Well,
Nils and Michele


P.S. Most of this log comes from an article we wrote for CPTnet. You can view both articles we wrote about our trip to Mina Caribe on our blog http://nilsandmichele.blogspot.com and see photos. If you are interested in receiving short articles from the Colombia team (about 8 per month) you can sign up at cpt.org or send us an e-mail and we will add you to the Colombia team yahoo group.


CPT MISSION STATEMENT: Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) Colombia is a community made up of trained volunteers from different cultures that forms part of the international, ecumenical organization, CPT. Our work is based in, though not limited to, the Middle Magdalena region of Colombia. We work together on grassroots initiatives to expose and transform structures of domination and oppression through active nonviolence in order to make possible a world grounded in respect, justice and love, even of enemies. Read more at www.cpt.org.

Mining Zone Accompaniment

In March, Michele and I spent 11 days accompanying the Agro-miners Federation as they held their leadership school and annual assembly in Mina Caribe. Click on the picture below to see an album of photos from that trip.

Accompanying the miner's federation

We also wrote a two articles about our time accompanying the Mining Federation for the CPT e-mail list. To read these articles, click here for part 1 and here for part 2.

You can also visit our Yahoo Groups website to read more articles written by our CPT team, or to sign up to receive regular (about twice weekly) updates on our work.

Opon river accompaniments

The last month we have each made several trips to the Opon river, where we accompany several communities that were displaced by violence and have now returned. CPT has accompanied these communities since 2001. Our accompaniment, along with the organizing the communities themselves have done, gives them the security to remain on their land.

Click on the album to see a bunch of photos we took over various trips.

Opon trips - March & April

Mining Delegation

Michele recently helped to coordinate a delegation of North Americans who spent 12 days learning about the issues impacting small gold miners. Michele's mom was one of the delegates. The delegation travelled by boat, truck and foot to get to a remote mining area. After 5 days of listening to miners the delegates returned to Bogota where they planned a public witness to bring attention to the issues facing the miners.

Mining Delegation

South America Log - No. 5

Greetings Friends and Family,

In the beginning of February we returned to Merida, Venezuela for a week of vacation with Nils host family from when he was a high school exchange student. In Merida, we enjoyed the cooler climate, hiking in the Andes with Nils host father, cooking with his host mother and playing with our Venezuelan nephews. Back in Barranca we are preparing to leave tomorrow for a 10-day accompaniment with small gold miners who are struggling to maintain their livelihood in the face of increasing multinational interest in their land.

We once heard Colombia described as holding a candle as the wax drips: beautiful and painful at the same moment. Living in Colombia these past 5 months it is easy to name many beautiful experiences: being welcomed into people’s homes, hiking to small villages in the mountains, swimming in an isolated and immense waterfall, traveling in an 80-person canoe through a jungle river, and working with Colombians who remain committed to the struggle for peace despite the violence around them. We also often feel the pain of those around us being burned by the candle’s wax.

Last week a boat driver got up in the morning to work on his small motorboat, ferrying people and goods across the Magdalena River. A few hours later the boat driver was killed in crossfire between the Colombian Army and an illegal paramilitary group.

Nils, another CPTer, and the Human Rights Ombudswoman were traveling on the river that morning to accompany a meeting of small farmers who are being forced from their land by the large palm tree plantations that are moving into the region. The Ombudswoman received a call to say that 4 people were dead in the nearby port town. Nils and his companions returned to the port town where they learned that an armed group of paramilitary members had come into town and forced two boat drivers to take them down the river in their boat. They let one of the drivers go, but the other one was forced to continue with them until they were intercepted by an Army patrol. A firefight broke out and the boat driver was killed, along with three paramilitary members. The civilian boat driver had little choice about transporting the armed paramilitaries, but he paid for their presence in his boat with his life.

In previous logs we have mentioned a powerful women’s organization that has been fighting for peace and justice in Barrancabermeja for 30 years. Members of the organization often receive death threats. Between 2002 and 2006 three staff members were assassinated. Now, the sister of one of the organization’s leaders has disappeared. On February 13, Katherine Gonzalez Torres, 20 years of age, left for work and she has not been heard from since. Her family joins the over 15,000 families in Colombia that have grieved a disappeared family member in the past 35 years. Only about 1,500 of the victims have reappeared alive.

With 4 of our teammates we joined hundreds of others at a vigil to call attention to Katherine’s disappearance. The street was blocked and people in cars, buses and motorcycles were forced to pause and consider the disappearance of Katherine.

"Today our womb hurts because we give life and today they are taking life away from us" was the phrase tirelessly repeated by leaders of the prayer vigil. "Today our womb hurts because one of our daughters is not here with us. The mother, who dedicated twenty years to raise this seed (her daughter) and make of her a woman, is missing her. Those that took her were also born from a woman's womb"

"We do not want the guerrillas or the paramilitaries, we are against the war. We don't give birth to or raise our sons and daughters for war", the leaders chanted loudly. A truck full of soldiers appeared from a side street and tried to drive through the demonstration. The solders were forced to turn around by women who stood firm in front of the truck.

As vigilers lit candles, Sister Marina prayed, "The light that we are lighting will not be extinguished. It's our job to keep it lit.”

Peace and light,

Michele and Nils

P.S. Most of the greetings we receive from home include a weather report. Here is ours. After a week of 102 degrees in the day and 82 degrees at night the forecast shows a break in the weather in a few days: 96 in the day and 78 at night! We seem to have traded a climate where the standard greeting begins, “It’s cold!” for one where conversations begin with, “It’s hot!”

P.P.S. We have convenient and fast e-mail access in the CPT office (it’s also the only air-conditioned room in the house) so please do not hesitate to write back. We love receiving news from home.

CPT MISSION STATEMENT: Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) Colombia is
a community made up of trained volunteers from different cultures
that forms part of the international, ecumenical organization, CPT.
Our work is based in, though not limited to, the Middle Magdalena
region of Colombia. We work together on grassroots initiatives to
expose and transform structures of domination and oppression
through active nonviolence in order to make possible a world
grounded in respect, justice and love, even of enemies.
Read more at www.cpt.org. 

Team photo

Here's the CPT Colombia team, as of February 20, 2007
Back row: Pierre, Noah, Jenny, Stuart, Michele, Sandra, and Julián
Front row: Suzanna, Nils and Joel

Our life here

Here are some photos of our everyday life here in Barrancabermeja:

Our life in Barrancabermeja

Visit to Venezuela, February 2007

We recently took some time off of the team; our first real vacation since we got here to Barrancabermeja in October. We went back to Mérida, Venezuela to visit Nils' former host family. (Nils lived in Mérida for a year in 1984-85 as an AFS exchange student.) It was also nice to get out of the heat of Barranca, and do some hiking in the mountains with Victor, Nils' host father. Click below to see photos of our trip.

Venezuela Feb. 07

URGENT ACTION

Update - GOOD NEWS!

Katherine Gonzalez Torres appears alive and well:

A full investigation of her kidnapping is called for

We rejoice with the news that Katherine Gonzalez Torres is alive and back in loving hands as of Monday, March 12th, 2007, after a month in captivity. As we reported in an earlier urgent action, Katherine disappeared on February 13th. Local human rights workers believe this event is likely linked to her sister's political work against continued paramilitary violence. However, local law enforcement authorities responsible for investigating her disappearance were reticent to recognize it as a politically motivated crime, suggesting that she may have run away with a boyfriend, a possibility people who knew her refuted vehemently.

Katherine reports that she was sedated and kept in a dark room, and routinely threatened by her captors. In the early morning hours of Monday the 12th , they left her, bound and blindfolded, near the bus terminal of Bucaramanga –about 2 hours from her home town of Barrancabermeja. She was able to free herself, and called her sister Sandra who immediately traveled to be with her. Her family reports that she is heavily traumatized and will now begin a period of physical and psychological recovery.

We wish to thank all those who responded to the original urgent action, and those who kept Katherine, her family, and the OFP in their hearts and prayers. Please continue to do so as Katherine and her family recover from this trauma.

For more information about the kidnapping and what you can do to help hold the investigators responsible see this Urgent Action

----Original urgent action below----

KATHERINE GONZALEZ TORRES is the 20 year old sister of Sandra Gutierrez Torres, a member of the leadership team of the Women’s Popular Organization (Organización Femenina Popular). The Popular Women’s Organization is an important partner in CPT’s work in Barrancabermeja.

On Tuesday, February 13, Katherine disappeared unexpectedly. We are concerned that she was abducted by an armed group because of her sister’s work with the OFP. Click here for a link to the Urgent Action on CPT’s website with more information about Katherine’s disappearance and actions you can take that may help return her to her family.

SOA Watch delegation

In January Nils helped host a delegation from School of the Americas Watch, that was here to learn more about the role of U.S. trained military in the Colombian conflict and to ask the Colombian administration to reconsider its commitment to sending soldiers to the School of the Americas at Ft. Benning in Georgia. SOA Watch is an organization that we have supported for a long time - the past six years one or both of us have attended the annual vigil at the school in November. It was great to host this group, and to share a little of our work here with them.

I wrote an article about the delegation, and there are pictures of the delegation available on CPT's website. Lisa Sullivan from SOA Watch also wrote an article about their visit to Colombia; much of the article is about the trip they took with us visiting rural communities.


Here's a picture of Nils with the delegation and a family they visited

Michele also led a delegation of North Americans here in Colombia last month. That delegation was organized by CPT, and she hasn't had time to do much writing about it yet. Michele's mom, Doris, took part in the delegation; it was great to have her here.

South America Log - No. 4

Dear friends and family,

Seasons greetings from Nils and Michele!  We hope
that you have passed a peaceful and joy-filled
holiday season.  As many people celebrate the birth
of the Prince of Peace, we pray for peace in areas
where there is violence around the world, whether
it is Minneapolis, Palestine, the Congo, Iraq, or
here in Colombia.

December was a busy month for us.  Nils and a
teammate spent almost 4 weeks in Nariño province
learning more about the Awá indigenous people and
preparing for a CPT accompaniment there.  We
learned about the Awá history and culture, and
the threats facing their communities.  We visited
a traditional Awá village, which is accessible
by hiking for 8 hours on trails through a
mountainous rainforest.  We had fun getting to
know the kids of the community, who watched us
attentively for hours from the front door of the
house where we stayed.  Some of the children spoke
only Awapit, so we had to communicate through
smiles and gestures.

The Awá are facing serious threats from the
armed conflict, since it is one of the target
areas for Plan Patriota, the U.S. funded military
strategy aimed at rooting out Colombia's guerrilla
armies.  Living in Colombia, one becomes accustomed
to seeing police officers and soldiers carrying
M-16 rifles patrolling commercial districts,
traveling the city streets, and standing at
military control points alongside many roads.
Despite feeling accustomed to seeing the military,
in Nariño I couldn't help but feel overwhelmed by
their presence.  Tanks and armored personnel
carriers lined the sides of the highway in places,
or filled city streets.  The soldiers were rarely
seen far from their armored vehicles. Military
checkpoints in Nariño are a serious affair.
Traveling the main highway, you can be assured that
you will be stopped, probably more than once, to
show your ID, get patted down, and have your
vehicle searched. Combat between the army and the
guerillas has forced many Awá to flee their homes.

The other threat to the Awá way of life is big
development projects.  The Awá have organized
themselves into 37 reservations, many of which are
recognized by the government, but some of which are
still in the process of certification.  Recently
the Colombian administration refused to re-affirm
a UN treaty recognizing the rights of indigenous
people, and in other ways the government has
signaled that they will not grant another acre to
indigenous communities. Instead, the administration
would like to open indigenous land up for mineral
exploration, commercial oil-palm plantations, and
hydroelectric projects, all in the name of "free
trade".

Meanwhile, Michele traveled to the Sur de Bolivar
(the southern part of Bolivar province) where she
met with small farmers whose crops had been damaged
and their health put at risk by the U.S. funded
aerial fumigation of coca crops.  In many cases
the fumigations missed coca crops, and instead
killed food crops, drifted over people's homes, and
contaminated water supplies.  Some farmers in the
area do grow small plots of coca, which is one of
the only crops that pays for itself given the
transportation costs required to get crops to
distant markets over bad roads.  However, the
fumigation programs have not been effective in
reducing the coca production of Colombia, and they
are driving many people off their land as their
legitimate food crops are wiped out.

In the days before Christmas, Michele and a
teammate accompanied people who live in a river
community near Barrancabermeja. There was time
to visit with families we have come to know over
the last few months, play with the new babies,
and help with preparing the traditional Christmas
custard or 'natilla'.  On December 24th a family
invited Michele and Erin to share their Christmas
dinner.  Michele and Erin also had the opportunity
to talk to an army battalion that had coerced two
young men to ferry them across the river in their
boat, in violation of International Humanitarian
Law.  Michele and Erin talked to the soldiers about
their responsibilities under the law, and got them
to agree to let the young men go home.  Their
parents were very relieved to see them return
safely.

We spent Christmas in Barrancabermeja with a few of
our teammates.  The holidays in Colombia can be a
time of increased threat for communities at risk,
so it was important for us to be available in case
an emergency accompaniment request came in.
Fortunately, everything was quiet here.  We had
lunch with teammates and then practiced a few
Christmas Carols in Spanish and visited our
neighbors. Our singing was warmly received and
several people remarked that they had seen
Christmas caroling in movies but had never
experienced it.

Peace be with you,
Nils and Michele

CPT MISSION STATEMENT: Christian Peacemaker Teams
(CPT) Coloimbia is a community made up of trained
volunteers from different cultures that forms part
of the international, ecumenical organization, CPT.
Our work is based in, though not limited to, the
Middle Magdalena region of Colombia. We work
together on grassroots initiatives to expose and
transform structures of domination and oppression
through active nonviolence in order to make
possible a world grounded in respect, justice and
love, even of enemies. Read more at www.cpt.org.

Security for this blog

We wanted to share pictures with you, but given the nature of the conflict and CPT's work here in Colombia, we also need to be careful about sharing information over the Internet. Therefore, in this blog we won't name any of the Colombians who appear in the photos, and we'll need to be somewhat vague about the locations we visit.

Michele and Nils

Here's a picture of Michele and I wearing our CPT shirts and hats while on an accompaniment. Michele's not looking at the camera, but why should she get all the cute pictures?