Justice for Colombia
Colombia is the most dangerous country in the world to be a trade unionist.
In 2002, British trade unionists formed Justice for Colombia, a NGO dedicated to campaigning for human rights and worker's rights.
- To provide concrete support to trade unions and other civil society organisations in Colombia in their struggle for human rights, trade union rights, democracy, peace and social justice and to promote links between progressive organisations in Britain and Colombia.
- To campaign against the systematic human rights abuses carried out against trade unionists and other civil society activists in Colombia and to highlight the regular collusion between the Colombian state security forces and illegal paramilitary groups and the impunity which the perpetrators benefit from.
- To support and promote a peaceful politically negotiated settlement to the conflict in Colombia and express opposition to foreign military intervention in Colombia.
- To insist that UN and ILO conventions and recommendations are implemented in Colombia in both law and practice.
More information is available from the Justice for Colombia website.
Community Vice President Keren Bender reports back on her recent 2007trip to Colombia as a member of the British delegation of Justice for Colombia.
Colombia is the most dangerous country in the world to be a trade unionist. Thousands have been killed in recent years by its army and paramilitary death squads. As the union’s Vice President, I travelled to the country with Justice for Colombia (JFC), the TUC backed coalition that supports the Colombian people and trade union movement in their struggle for peace and social justice. The delegation was made up of senior trade unionists, human rights lawyers and Labour Party people keen to learn at first hand what is really going on there.
From landing in the capital Bogotá, we were accompanied by armed police everywhere we went until we boarded a plane to fly up country. Many hours later after taking a coach and local bus we reached a remote mountain village. There we met locals, mostly peasant farmers and indigenous people, who wanted to tell us what was happening. It was a secret meeting as they feared reprisals if it became known they had spoken to us.
It felt surreal at times, sitting in the open air among that beautiful scenery, hearing one horror story after another. We struggled to hold back tears as the people told their stories with dignity and thanked us for coming to listen to them. Their message was clear, “Tell the world what’s going on“.
Before returning to Bogotá that night, we visited a shantytown, home to some 1.4 million displaced people. Among all this filth and degradation, the hundreds of children who followed us were all spotlessly clean. Here we heard many stories of abuse and hardship but the one I remember most was told by a 12-year-old boy whose mother had been shot dead in her shack only a few days before by the police who ‘apparently’ were looking for someone else. As the eldest of six children, he now has to fend for them. The police will never be brought to book for his mother’s murder.
When we returned to Bogotá that night we were all emotionally drained but we couldn’t have been prepared for what was still to come. Everywhere we went we heard the most horrific accounts of human rights abuses, from intimidation to torture to assassinations, from those who had suffered the abuses or those speaking on behalf of loved ones who had ‘disappeared’ or been murdered.
The ones who suffer are people like you and I, - teachers, health and public service workers, farmers, students and trade unionists. And it will be pressure from people like us that puts an end to this abuse of human rights.
If you would like to find out more about Justice for Colombia’s work and how you can support it, visit www.justiceforcolombia.org
