Challenges to the Colombian Peace Accord - Roundtable and Report Launch

Challenges to the Colombian Peace Accord: Forgotten Regions and Environmental Defenders at Risk

Roundtable and Report Launch

29.10.24

In attendance:

• Héctor Jaime Viansco – leader of the Reguardo Colonial Cañamomo Lomaprieta (speaker) – assisted by interpreter James Lupton

• Sara Chandler – Honorary KC and founder of the Colombia Caravana (speaker)

• Lara Domínguez - Lawyer at Forest Peoples Programme (speaker)

• Fabian Hamilton – PHRG Chair

• Invited NGO and CSO representatives

Chair: Ellie Chowns MP – PHRG Officer

This event was timed to coincide with this month’s UN Biodiversity Conference CPD COP 16 in Cali, Colombia, at which the Global Diversity Framework, which specifically references the right to a healthy environment and protection of indigenous peoples’ rights, was discussed.

Main Points:

Ellie Chowns MP opened with remarks about the economic, political and environmental situation in Colombia:

• Despite the signing of the Peace Accord in Colombia in 2016, armed groups continue to operate and terrorise some communities and their representatives.

• Colombia was the most dangerous country for environmental and land rights defenders in 2023.

• Indigenous groups, rural communities and environmental defenders are particularly at risk as they attempt to protect their lands and habitats from: paramilitaries; rebel groups; narco-traffickers; and powerful international commercial interests seeking to profit from mining, monocrop farming and coca cultivation.

• State institutions are unable to provide proper protection for at-risk communities.

• The Petro Government, committed to environmental protection, has only 18 months to drive forward the implementation of the Peace Accord.

Héctor Jaime Viansco, a Colombian indigenous leader whose community faces ongoing land dispossession, described the oppression, violence, and constant threats he faces in defending his people’s ancestral land.

• Despite decades of struggle, his community has preserved its way of life, traditional governance, spirituality, and security, and protected its local environment.

• Peace cannot progress without basic needs, such as clean water, food, education and security, being met.

• UK companies needed to be bound by a legal framework holding them to account for human rights and environmental harms.

Sara Chandler from the Colombia Caravana, a delegation of lawyers from 24 countries that has visited Colombia every 2 years since 2008 to investigate the situation of lawyers and human rights and environmental defenders, presented the interim report findings and recommendations of their most recent visit in 2024, focused on access to justice.

• There has been a proliferation of armed groups despite President Petro’s pursuit of a Total Peace policy.

• Lawyers and judges face serious risks, with many lawyers having been assassinated.

• Human Rights Defenders need more protection – including through relocation programs, legal assistance and awareness-raising of their plight.

• Justice systems which underpin the Peace Accord must be supported, with financial and political support.

• The protection of fragile ecosystems in ways which empower local communities should be prioritised.

Finally, Lara Domínguez from Forest Peoples Programme discussed the need for political space to enable forest communities to secure their rights and futures.

• Reflecting on CBD COP 16, she emphasised the importance of including local voices in biodiversity initiatives.

• Key demands of indigenous leaders include having specific indicators to track preservation of traditional lands in the monitoring framework, and the establishment of a permanent indigenous body.

• Working with indigenous communities is economically, environmentally and politically critical: the cheapest way to protect the environment is to title and return land to the indigenous people who have looked after it for centuries.

The PHRG will raise greater awareness of these issues in Parliament and more widely, as well as continue to work closely with affected HRDs and communities, and to monitor related developments.