Repression, Displacement and Coffee Brigades in Dolores, Colombia

[Judi Lynn]

Weekend Edition March 7-9, 2014
Striking Blows Against the Empire

Repression, Displacement and Coffee Brigades in Dolores, Colombia
by JAMES JORDAN

The municipality of Dolores, Tolima in the heart of Colombia’s coffee country has been enduring more than ten years of repression related to the discovery of oil in the region. At least five residents have been killed by members of the Colombian Armed Forces and a series of detentions of labor and community leaders have taken place. Explosives used to look for oil in an area with a well-known geological fault, have also lead to “natural” disasters contributing to devastating mudslides. All this has resulted in several periods of massive displacement of farming families. Between 1993 and 2005, the time of the last census, the population of Dolores decreased by 2,000 residents, leaving just over 9,000 people. Since 2005, there have been other mass displacements not yet included in that count. Currently a number of families are on the verge of being displaced because they are unable to bring in the May and June coffee harvests, having lost their primary harvesters because of arrests and other repressive measures.

~ snip ~

Dolores, Tolima, is one of the most threatened municipalities in one of the most threatened departments of Colombia. But it is not alone, and what is happening there is indicative of what is happening throughout the country, even as the peace process is underway. There are a number of disturbing indicators. In 2011, the same year Congress passed the US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement , the human rights group Somos Defensores reported that assaults against human rights defenders were the highest in 10 years. Then in 2012, they reported the number had risen by another 49%, with 97% of those assassinated being from rural areas. And while the numbers for the entire year are not yet available, the first semester of 2013 saw a 21% increase in murders of human rights defenders.

Likewise, in 2012 the number of those forcibly displaced rose by 83% according to CODHES (the Consultancy on Human Rights and Displacement), with some 42,724 persons on record as having been displaced. Colombia already leads the world in the number of internally displaced persons.

Perhaps most disturbing has been the murder of 30 leaders of the Patriotic March (Marcha Patriótica), the grassroots mobilization for a just peace with popular participation in peace negotiations. And lest we forget, Colombia continues to be the most dangerous country in the world to be a unionist, with union representations at an abysmal low of just 4% of the workplace, yet with more unionists murdered there than anywhere else in the world. Many fear that all these indicators together are presaging a repeat of what happened to the Patriotic Union (Unión Patriótica) in the 1980s and 1990s. During that time this political party and the entire peace process were destroyed as paramilitaries and members of the Armed Forces assassinated over 5,000 UP candidates and elected officials. A major factor in this genocide was the lack of international awareness and accompaniment which otherwise might have provided a shield against the violence.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/03/07/repression-displacement-and-coffee-brigades-in-dolores-colombia/

[MisterP]

1. reminds me of what happened in the Yucatan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acteal_Massacre

[Judi Lynn]

2. I am glad to have been able to see this. It was as recent as December 22, 1997.

So much is omitted from the information you'd expect we should learn from our own newspapers, major network news shows, etc, and I'm sure there are many who actually still believe if anything radical happens they would have heard about it through our corporate media.

Not a chance, actually, is there?

As always, the official response was to in pin it on innocent people. That's been done to DEATH, hasn't it?

Thanks for the info. on the Acteal Massacre. We needed to know.