Colombia: Sixteen Indians injured in explosion

6 Mar 2007

Sixteen members of the Guayabero tribe in Colombia have been injured after a land mine exploded on their reserve.

The incident occurred after a Guayabero boy found the mine among rubbish left on his people’s reserve by soldiers from Colombia’s Special Forces School.

The incident is the latest in a long line of tragedies caused by the presence of soldiers on the Guayaberos’ reserve. In 2005 nine people were injured in an explosion – one young woman lost both her hands – and a twelve year old boy died in another explosion in 1997.

The reserve was established after the Guayaberos fled the violence of Colombia's drugs war in their traditional territory.

http://www.survivalfrance.org/news.php?id=2253

S.O.S.On behalf of the Indigenous Peoples: Nukak Makú, Guayabero, Sikuani, and Tucano

( Translated by Nolen Johnson a CSN translator)


The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia, ONIC, is sending an S.O.S. because of the grave and repeated human rights violations against the Nukak Makú, Guayabero, Sikuani, and Tucano indigenous peoples. In a visit made to the state of Guaviare we witnessed first hand the critical human rights situation in which these indigenous people are living.

1. The problems faced by the Nukak and the majority of the Colombian indigenous peoples are not new, they have been denounced for years by the ONIC – the murder of members of indigenous communities. In December 2005, the Nukak had already been forced to abandon their territories, due to the war and drugs, the coca farmers, the guerillas, the right wing paramilitaries, and the Colombian army that have occupied their lands, as well as the development and execution of military operations as part of the Plan Colombia framework and Plan Patriota. With this war as a backdrop, there is a proven continuous violation of human rights, resembling a permanent genocide against the Guayabero, Sikuani, and Tucano peoples that have been pressured to leave their homelands, small farms and settlements.
   
   
2. The Nukak- Maku indigenous people located in the Colombian Amazon are found between the Guaviare and Inirida rivers, and from the Sabanas de la Fuga to the western border of the state of Guaviare, with an approximate land area of one million hectares that allow them to hunt, fish and gather wild plants.
   
   
3. The last true ecological nomads are constantly falling in number. In 1985 there were approximately 1200 people, in less than 20 years their numbers have been reduced to less than 500. The Nukak Makú today are 255 indigenous people found displaced in four areas near to the town of Guaviare. This condition puts them in risk of disappearance.
   
   
4. The fundamental characteristic of the Nukak is its organization into small nomadic groups, which vary between 6 and 30 people united by bloodlines, affinity or alliance. These indigenous people move around taking advantage of places where there are water, and concentrations of vegetables for gathering, fishing and hunting areas, and places for seasonal habitation, as well as for meeting and commercial exchange. The Nukak maintain the authenticity of their language since they do not speak Spanish. They migrate from place to place with only the minimum amount of things to go to another place. Their only riches are their territory and the natural bounty of the jungle.
   
   
5. In addition there is the dramatic situation of children living orphaned and abandoned, and their lack of food security. There is also the change in eating habits that is caused by changes in their lives and the health of their gene pool.
   
   
6. The ONIC asks itself: What are the reasons behind the policies to displace these people? The indigenous people assume that the policies are due to the huge transformations that are taking place in the world and have to do with international politics and economic and political pacts like the FTAA, the Free Trade Agreement, and its components regarding our country, like Plan Puebla Panama, Plan Colombia and the Americas Initiative, as well as topics that are so crucial for our peoples such as intellectual property, biodiversity, natural resources, the war on terror, and drug trafficking which affect our security and autonomy, and their desire to take us from our lands by force, and give them over to the huge multinationals and their mega projects.
   
   
7. The government policies regarding indigenous people are in violation of treaties signed with the international community, they do not follow international directives when rights are curtailed, at a time in which the government is committed to the weakening of culture, the deterioration of the environment, given the fumigation policies that damage the ecosystem, and the life of people of the Amazon and the Orinoco basin.
   (snip/...)

http://www.americas.org/item_27248