On Thursday we were on the streets of Bogotá as thousands of Colombians took to the streets again, this time in homage to the more than 15,000 victims of state terrorism in the country. We marched with campesinos from BP’s oil exploration region of Casanare, in the capital to attend the National Movement of Victims of State Crimes forum being held this weekend. The slogan, ‘for our dead, not a minute of silence, only a lifetime of struggle’ was particularly poignant as we stood beside, Dolores, whose two sons were killed by the army last year.

Espacio and COS-PACC, the Colombian social organization we’re working with in Casanare, have set up a scheme to protect threatened members of rural communities in the region by ‘twinning’ them with people in Britain, who undertake to follow-up their situation with the authorities and build up personal solidarity links as pen-pals, to remind people that they are not alone and disposable, as the strategists of state terror would like to have them believe. To take part get in touch.
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‘I am Colombia’ were the words stamped across the rather artificially large chest of the woman who nearly ran us over in her four-by-four on Monday morning. No doubt she was on her way to the government-sponsored mobilization against the FARC guerrilla that took place in cities across the world today, despite condemnation from Colombian social movements, the left-leaning opposition and the mother of Ingrid Betancourt - the former Green Party senator who has been a hostage of the FARC since 2002. read full story / add a comment

Our friends had yet another theat today:
SON OF A BITCH GUERRILLAS, WE HAVE YOU UNDER CONTROL - THE SHIT THAT YOUR ALLY GUSTAVO PETRO [A CENTRE-LEFT POLITICIAN] PUBLISHES IS THE SAME THAT YOU PREACH - TIME IS RUNNING OUT - YOU DON’T THINK YOU’RE A MILITARY OBJECTIVE YOU BUNCH OF FUCKING COMMUNISTS - YOUR TIME TO LEAVE SANTANDER IS UP - NOW YOU’RE GOING TO A MASS GRAVE ALONG WITH YOUR FAMILIES - KEEP YOUR IDEOLOGY IT’S NO GOOD FOR THIS COUNTRY - EVERYTHING YOU DO IS BEING WATCHED - GUERRILLA JOSE DOMINGO FLORES - JAVIER CORREA - LUIS EDUARDO ALIAS CHILE - NOW YOU’RE GOING TO DIE - YOUR FAMILIES ARE IN DANGER - ALL OF YOU WILL BE DISMEMEBERED AND BURIED - THE BLACK EAGLES EXIST - DON’T THINK WE DON’T MEAN IT WE YOU SHITHEADS - WE WILL DO IT WITH NO MERCY read full story / add a comment

Please help make sure that our friends don’t end this month in a mass grave.
On Wednesday night, we stayed with our friend Luis Eduardo Garcia who is a member of the Colombian food-workers’ union, Sinaltrainal, and a worker in the Coca-Cola factory. At 5 o’clock on Thursday morning Guayabo went with Luis Eduardo and another member of Sinaltrainal, Jose Domingo Florez, to give out leaflets workers starting their shift, reminding them that that day, 6 December, was the eleventh anniversary of the murder union leader Isidro Gil, who was killed inside a Coke bottling plant during negotiations with the company.
We’ve just received news that that Thursday night, when Domingo got home, he found an envelope in his garage containing a death threat. read full story / add a comment

The first report from Bristolians Guayasa and Guayabo, who are currently in Colombia for a year providing international accompaniment (i.e. being a sort of human shield) and researching the impact of BP with local activists.

This week, we released the report from last month’s solidarity mission to the oil-rich region of Casanare, where BP operates and where the Colombian army and paramilitaries continue to kill peasant farmers - either as a consequence of their protests against BP’s devastating social and ecological impact or, it would appear, simply because they are surplus to the requirements of the oil industry. read full story / add a comment