ACT SitRep

Colombia Situation Report

No. 1/2004

Geneva, Geneva, June 16, 2004

Information provided by Michael Jordan, Diakonie Emergency Aid, in Bogota

Cartagena del Chairá, a small town of 11,000 inhabitants in the heart of the Colombian Amazon, stands as a stark example of the situation in this country. For the past few months, the central government has been spraying the fields with the pesticide glyphosate to destroy coca plantations in the war to eradicate drugs. A result of this has been that subsistence farmers have also had their crops wiped out, destroying their primary source of food.

In early May, Colombian security forces began a military offensive against the guerrillas, who are active in large areas of Caquetá Department. Schools and other official buildings, for instance, have been taken over by the troops, although most of the buildings had already been abandoned when 4,500 people from Cartagena del Chairá and the outlying areas fled the combat and persecution by the soldiers and guerrillas during the first two weeks of May.

The principal of the village school in Peñas Coloradas said all of his 650 pupils, together with their families, have gone to neighboring areas not yet accessed by the military or to Florencia, the capital of Caquetá, in search of protection. Shanty towns have sprung up around the urban areas. According to official statistics from March 2004, Florencia, a city of 150,000 people, is hosting 23,000 refugees.

Colombia as a whole has more than 2.5 million displaced people.

The escalating conflict has made the work of ACT member Diakonie Emergency Aid, which focuses on improving food security and strengthening communities, even more difficult. In the isolated villages blockaded by the soldiers, Diakonie is attempting to secure small parcels of land in order to ensure immediate subsistence to families affected by the war. This is a method already in use in other conflict-torn rural areas in the southern part of the country. During times of intense combat, emergency humanitarian projects are temporarily disrupted, because the field officers can no longer access the region.

Diakonie has in the past undertaken similar projects in Florencia when people have been displaced by conflict. During recent years, hundreds of small gardens have been established among the makeshift homes so that the displaced people in urban areas can grow food. Currently 200 such plots of land are being established. The projects not only supplement material needs of families, but also help them come to terms with the violence they have experienced and to recover a sense of hope for a better future, in spite of the ongoing war.

The beneficiaries receive technical aid and, to a lesser degree, some agricultural tools.

The ACT members responding in Colombia are: Diakonie Emergency Aid, the Evangelical Lutheran Church – (IELCO)/Lutheran World Federation-Department for World Service and ACT Netherlands/Project Counselling Service.

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