Celebrating 25 years of working for peace in Colombia

The Colombia Support Network is celebrating its 25 years of work for peace in Colombia. 

Csn seeks a negotiated solution to the Colombian conflict, which has been tearing apart the country for 50 years. 

We believe the best way for us to celebrate is to invite a representative of the Peace Community of San Jose de Apartado (PC) to join us here in the PC’s sister community of Dane County.

The PC is located in northwest Colombia, near the border with Panama. 

This is a privileged zone, where national and international interests converge with plans to develop mines and production of goods using sweatshop labor. 

These interests seek to expel PC residents by force. 

The PC campesinos, who produce cacao (chocolate), avocados and beans, decided to organize to avoid being displaced from the land that is theirs, where they were born and grew up. 

They realized that only by being united in nonviolent resistance could they defend their lands.

Their philosophy is to work together in solidarity. 

They recognize each one’s responsibility for the other. 

Everyone participates in decision-making and everyone realizes that an action taken by any of them can affect the whole. 

Decisions are made without pressure or exclusion.

The PC selected Jesus Emilio Tuberquia to represent it. 

He is especially interested in knowing more about Family Farm Defenders in the United States, because their struggle to maintain their lands and traditions makes them natural companions of the PC residents.

The enemies of peace in Colombia see the PC as guerrillas, because they speak of the right to possess and defend their lands. 

This was a fundamental principle of the Farc guerrillas when they were formed in the 1.960s. 

But nothing is further from the Farc’s use of violence to realize this goal than the resistance of this community, which has only their moral strength and their voice as a true representative of the victims of ambition and power. 

For good reason the PC was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2.007.