Colombia

Colectiva Reparando Ausencias (Repairing Absences Group)

"We need them Because they were willing to love, they dressed up, all they wanted was to be happy as in fairy tales and they were unaware that many times they end like horror stories. Because they loved their neighbour - a neighbour - more than themselves. They obeyed the mandate to endure, to hope for love to change him, they abided solemnly "until death do us part".

Video featuring Accion colectiva de objetores y objetoras de conscienca (Collective Action of Conscientious Objectors), by FOR Peace Presence

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By Ruben Dario Pardo Santamaria

1. A hostile context

The peace community of San Jose de Apartado was founded in 1997 and was born in adverse conditions for nonviolent resistance. The Community is located in an area of Uraba, Colombia, where strong economic interests are at play and where armed conflict is waged between guerrillas (the FARC), state forces and (usually working in collusion with the state) paramilitaries. It is an area where political terror, assassination and intimidation has been used to eliminate leaders and activists. The Peace Community itself is formed of displaced people, people whose parents and grandparents were also victims of violence. Throughout its existence, the Peace Community has had to face campaigns to discredit it from the highest levels of national government and the media, especially under the government of Alvaro Uribe.

The Peace Community has more than 1,000 members, even though around 150 members have been killed - by state security forces, by paramilitaries or by the FARC.

2. Towards a strategy of civil resistance

What began with the urgent need to find practical alternatives for displaced people has grown into a project offering an alternative to the current model of society. This has three dimensions:

Resistance to war and forced displacement: establishing a mechanism for the protection of civilians in a context of strong armed conflict. Establishing a sustainable basis for community cohesion, including developing holistic and ecological economic alternatives. Constructing peace: at the everyday internal level of nonviolent forms of relationship; at the political level of condemning the use of violence and supporting a negotiated political solution to the armed conflict: through outreach, spreading the idea of zones of peace and offering guidance to other local communities. 2.1 Economic Strategy

In a war zone, there is not the normal supply of essential goods. Therefore the Community needs to grow its own food, but cooperates with "fair trade" groups to market coca and baby bananas. In addition, it took the initiative to organise meetings and courses (under the title Peasant University or University of Resistance) to share information about ecological forms of agriculture.

2.2 Policy Strategy

The emergence of the Peace Community has been a radical challenge to those who seek to dominate a territory, above all the armed actors of the state, the paramilitaries and the guerrilla. To survive, the Community needs to build relationships that on the one hand reduce the pressure on the Peace Community, and on the other strengthen its resilience - relationships at the local, national and international level.

2.3 Strategy: community cohesion 2.3.1 Agreement policy for coexistence

The founding declaration of the Peace Community lays out principles of demilitarisation and neutrality which represent the common denominator of the community. The act of signing this declaration is a unifying force for the collective.

2.3.2 Integral Training

Training has been vital to the community. First in preparing to establish it - when there were workshops with displaced people and prospective members. Now the Training Committee concentrates internally on strengthening the understanding of and commitment to the Community principles, analysing its situation, and evaluating the whole process of civil resistance. It teaches conflict resolution skills within the Community itself, and aims to strengthen the resolve of Community members not to join any armed group. The Training Committee works not only with families, coordinators and working groups of members of the Community, but also with other families in the area.

2.4 Strategy: protection

This refers to activities to reduce the risk of violation of human rights of Community members and the very process of civil resistance. This involves: - documentation and public denunciation of violations committed by all armed actors; - identification of community spaces by erecting billboards declaring its principles; - disseminating information through small publications, videos, national and international meetings on its territory, national and international tours and since late 2004 with the creation of its own website; - petitions to the national government and increasingly to international agencies, which sometimes have led to favourable verdicts, restrictions placed on US military aid, the trial of soldiers accused of killing Community leaders in February 2005; - protective accompaniment: Peace Brigades International regularly accompany transport to and from the Community, while other international groups, including the US Fellowship of Reconciliation, that provides protection through accompaniments in the community.

3. Proposal for new neutral zones

Unlike "safe areas" created by agreement between armed forces, in the Peace Community is the civilian population itself that has decided to create a physical space and social protection for those not involved in the war. The peace communities are not a mere space of survival amid the bullets, but seek to build peace with social justice, a way of life based on dignity, autonomy and solidarity.

4. Ability to resist repression

The peace community of San Jose de Apartado has been one of the worst hit by political violence in Colombia. Political repression is aimed at breaking the principles and beliefs of those who opt for peace, at spreading mistrust and intimidation, and crippling hat contrast individual and collective levels established. Through selective actions and copies of direct violence, spreads intimidation and mistrust among the population, crippling people's capacity to react.

Persistence in this resistance despite the violence can be partly explained by the absence of better alternatives for people who have been forcibly displaced. However, it also depends on more positive factors: - a strong social consciousness, acting as a subject and not subordinate to political orders; - the perception that, despite the armed actors, the process of resistance has a chance of success; - confidence that nonviolence offers better chances of survival; - an unshakable commitment not to abandon the struggle for which so many martyrs have already given their lives.

5. Different types of resistance

The Peace Community resists at many levels: - resisting malaria, poverty and lack of basic services in such areas of Colombia; - resisting the terror of legal and illegal armed groups; - resisting the temptation of revenge, in a territory where it would be extremely easy to join any armed actor and seek vengeance against an enemy; - resisting the imposition of an exclusive and authoritarian model of society, while proposing a project of life based on a comprehensive vision of dignity and development.

6. As a conclusion

Among the most important factors that have enabled peasants and farmers of San Jose de Apartado to maintain nonviolent resistance during the past 10 years, are:

the accompaniment of entities of the Catholic Church; the Community's democratic and flexible organizational structure, strengthening the sense of belonging and community cohesion; the improvement if the lives of women and children in respect to what they had before; strengthening of internal discipline, respect for the rules of conduct agreed, and loyalty to fundamental principles of neutrality and nonviolence; implementing internal measures of protection; opening up spaces for consultation with governmental actors; implementing economic strategies to meet the basic needs; a progressive process of integration and coordination of actions with other local experiences of civil resistance in different regions of Colombia; training new leaders; the example of martyrs motivating continued resistance; protection offered by international accompaniment; gradual consolidation of a network international support in many countries; the moral strength of the community and its resilience in the face of violence by armed groups.

The 'Stop Blood Coal' campaign is run by PAX in the Netherlands, targetting the Drummond and Prodeco (the Colombian subsidiary of Switzerland-based Glencore) mining companies. The campaign aims to expose and challenge the links between paramilitary violence and coal mining in Colombia, support communities in their search for truth and reconciliation, and pressure European energy companies to take action against their suppliers accused of human rights abuses.

A new report from ACOOC addresses recruitment to the military in Colombia, focusing on the phenomenon of arbitrary detention - usually undertaken through batidas (raids). Though batidas are banned, this report shows that, in practice, they are still common.

The report has been produced by the Acción colectiva de objetores y objetoras de conciencia (ACOOC: Conscientious Objectors' Collective Action) based on information collected in conjunction with other organisations and groups in the Proceso Distrital de Objeción de Conciencia.

In January, the Colombian Constitutional Court ruled that the army should release Cristian Andrés Cortés Calderón. Cristian had been recruited last August, whilst he was still in his final year of high school. Students are allowed to postone military service, but Cristian was nonetheless called up. In court, Cristian's father said that Cristian also works at night in a supermarket to financially support his family. The court ordered that he be released from the military within 48 hours.

The Court however also ruled that Cristian would still be liable for conscription when his studies end.

Sources: corteconstitucional, Sentencia T-004/16, 19 January 2016; Caracol Radio, Ejército no puede reclutar a estudiantes de bachillerato así sean mayores de edad, 23 February 2016.

Colombian conscientious objectors have releseased a statement with conscientious objectors in Bolivia. Read it here in English (Spanish version here).

Original statement in Spanish

This year on the 22nd of March, the Bolivian Plurinational Constitutional Tribunal (PCT) rejected the right of conscientious objection as an alternative to its obligatory military service. This has occurred in spite of the generally agreed-upon right to constitutional protection, brought to attention by 18-year-old objector Ignacio Orías Calvo, who claimed refuge under this fundamental right based on his religious beliefs.

This decision would not seem to follow the same logic of a government fostered by a constitution which, at least on paper, affirms that “Bolivia is a pacifist state, which promotes the Right to Peaceful Solutions and a Peaceful culture”. In actuality, what would appear to be a contradiction fits neatly within the patriarchal and militaristic confines that have characterized the Movement for Socialism of Bolivia (MAS), ever since its army first took root in the country. 

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—People's Army (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia: FARC) have released the first of an estimated 2,000 child soldiers from within its ranks. Last week, it declared its intention to stop recruiting under 18s.

A new website has been launched to allow people to easily report illegal batidas (press gangs) that happen on the streets of Colombia. http://batidasreport.net/ allows you to easily upload stories and pictures, and will list batidas that have occurred, especially in Antioquia and Cundinamarca. 

Return to Conscientious Objection: A Practical Companion for Movements

Oscar was born in Medellín and is a member of the Medellín Network for Conscientious Objection (Tejido por Objecion de Conciencia de Medellín). He is also a leader ofMedellín's Mennonite Peace Church social action group and the secretary of the Medellín Network of Peace Churches, as well as being a nonviolent activist and a restorative justice facilitator at two detention centres in Medellín. Here, he gives us an account of working in Colombia's conscientious objection movement on the grounds of his Mennonite interpretation of Christianity.

For many people, Christianity is synonymous with ecclesiastical hierarchy, the Crusades, economic exploitation, dark alliances with sectors of the far right, and other phenomena of the kind. That branch of the Church which has worked for justice and dignity over the course of centuries, and which has assumed a historic commitment to resisting any kind of oppression, in the name of Jesus, has been rendered invisible. In this branch of the Church however, we have been steadfastly promoting the struggle for the protection of human rights, the environment, all forms of life, and dignity as the most important property of every human being, considering God the primary interested party in this struggle, based on our interpretation of Jesus' summary of the Ten Commandments: 'Love God above all things and your neighbour as yourself'.

Return to Conscientious Objection: A Practical Companion for Movements

Julián Andrés Ovalle was born in Bogotá, Colombia, in 1981. For ten years, he was part of Acción Colectiva de Objetores y Objetoras de Conciencia (ACOOC, Conscientious Objectors' Collective Action), an organisation which aims to create the concrete conditions for people to be able to opt for alternatives to militarism, specifically alternatives to obligatory military service in Colombia. Currently, he is working towards the consolidation of a Latin American and Caribbean Antimilitarist Network. Here, he writes about being a conscientious objector on the grounds of his pacifism in Colombia.

The persistence of wars is shocking evidence that people are the ones who sustain them. It’s not just the major powers, those with industrial interests or armies; we individuals from all over the world provide financing and legitimacy which keeps weapons firing indiscriminately. It is not just neoliberal interest in controlling land for the exploitation of its natural resources, it is also our everyday consumption which enables large companies to continue extracting, producing, and selling for profit.

Return to Conscientious Objection: A Practical Companion for Movements

Rafael Uzcategui is a Venezuelan conscientious objector, author, and human rights activist who has been active with War Resisters' International, and in antimilitarism more generally, for many years. Here, he summarises the main tendencies of the Latin American conscientious objection movement, and details how his own nonviolent anarchist position fits into this picture.

During the eighties, many Latin American countries were living under military dictatorships or suffering the consequences of civil war. These were also the days of the Cold War, during which the US considered Latin America one of its 'zones of influence': almost like a back garden. The traumatic and progressive democratisation process meant that broad swathes of the continent's youth developed an antimilitarist sentiment, which began to take on an organised and political dimension. As an adolescent at the beginning of the nineties in Barquisimeto, a town 5 hours away from the Venezuelan capital of Caracas, my peers and I had to hide ourselves twice a year for fifteen days, to avoid compulsory military service. Otherwise they would seize us on the streets and, without wasting words, force us into a truck, with others just as terrified, and from there take us to the barracks. For many of us, these forced recruitment raids or 'press gangs' were the starting point for our rejection of authority and of the military uniform.