Walking in the Footprints of Empire: Be Not Afraid

By Beth Harris, CPT delegation member, Fall 2007

Although the nine members of our Christian Peacemaker delegation to Colombia ranged in age from twenty-two to sixty-two years old and had worshiped in a diversity of faith-based communities, when we met, we had much in common. None of us slept the night before we flew to Bogota, and we were ready to open our hearts to the peacemakers in Colombia. We had come to Colombia not only for a fact-finding delegation, but also guidance concerning the directions of our own lives.

In 1984, Ron Sider, made a speech "Jesus' Call to Be Peacemakers" to a Mennonite World Conference that motivated the founding of the Christian Peacemaker Teams. Ron proclaimed, "Unless we Mennonites and Brethren in Christ are ready to start to die by the thousands in dramatic vigorous new exploits for peace and justice, we should sadly confess that we never really meant what we said" (about our commitment to nonviolent peacemaking). Members of our delegation had all signed statements of personal responsibility concerning the risks that we were taking by entering areas where violent conflict could take place and wondered what dangers we might face.

Our delegation leader, Rev. Daniel Dale, told us, "Empire has left one of its biggest footprints in Colombia." Our journey inside this footprint took us to religious communities creating peace churches in war zones, displaced children seeking comfort in art, music and dance, youth refusing to be killers and cannon fodder, and rural communities trying to overcome poverty in their earthly paradise. Collectively we combined our new insights with our own creative power to join the Colombians' growing nonviolent resistance movement.

Although our group from the United States and Canada never seemed to be in physical danger, we met Colombian activists who were risking their lives. Furthermore, our meeting with the Campesina Association of the Cimitarra River Valley (ACVC) was canceled because four members of the leadership had just been jailed, and fourteen more were issued arrest warrants. Our delegation prayed in front the ACVC office, and the remainder of our time in Colombia occurred in the shadow of these arrests. Human rights and development groups in Barrancabermeja declared their support for ACVC and criticized the arrests as part of a broader effort by the Colombian government to taint the reputations of the leadership of the civilian popular movement, including campesinos (small farmers), indigenous people, Afro-Colombians and students, as working with the "terrorists."

In order to understand the significance and courage of the peacemakers in Colombia, we had to learn about war's role in empire building and its consequences for the Colombian people. Colombia has received the greatest amount of U.S. military aid of any country in the Americas; it also has the second highest internally displaced population in the world (second to Sudan). The regions with the greatest numbers of displacements are those with the most natural resources, including oil, coal, gold and other minerals, and where multinational corporations are accumulating land for agribusinesses, transforming land rich with bio-diversity into monoculture production fields.

"I have lived everything that is war."

We learned about the nightmarish conditions, including gruesome massacres, which had caused displacements from rural areas. "Manuel," a 23-year old man who had been displaced, told us, "I have lived everything that is the war." He said,

In a neighboring town the paras took my uncle and cousin. My two other cousins went out looking for them, and the paras captured them, too. The townspeople pleaded to the paras not to kill them. But all were killed and thrown over a bridge. My uncle's last son joined the guerrillas. Later he changed sides and became a commander of the paras My cousin then went the house of a woman who had fed him when he had been a guerrilla. He told her that he knew that she had fed the enemy. She answered that she had no choice; they had been armed, just as he was armed now, and they had forced her to feed them. My cousin then killed her, cut off her head, and put it on a stick as warning to the others in the town. He became a very bad man. . . . In my town, the paras had a truck called the "Last Voyage" truck. Those who were captured and placed on this truck had their throats and bellies slit. The paras threw away their guts and dumped their bodies into the river.

Stunned by the horrors that Manuel had experienced, we formed a circle, and Rev. Dan led us in prayer for divine guidance for healing and peace.

Forty years of war

Colombian community organizers, religious leaders, human rights activists, and scholars shared with us their understandings of the political history of Colombia, which had created the conditions for such a long and brutal war. We learned that along with the natural wealth of Colombia has come a great disparity between the rich and the poor. About 400 persons control 85 percent of the legal economy, and .4 percent of the landowners own 61 percent of rural land. The Colombian government has never had the capacity to enforce its rule over the entire territory, which is about three times the size of Montana. Consequently, regional economic elites and armed groups operating outside the government have imposed their rule in various regions of the country. Paramilitary groups were first established during the 1940s by the Conservative party in its efforts to expel members of its political opposition, the Liberal party.

In 1962, as part of the U.S. war against communism, the CIA taught counter-insurgency and terror techniques to the Colombian police and paramilitary groups. The brutal repression against opposition to the government led to the consolidation of small bands of leftist insurgents, who had been active in organizations of small farmers, religious communities, students and faculty. Since the mid-1960s there has been an armed struggle for political power between the leftist armed groups, referred to as the guerrillas, and the collaborative effort between the Colombian government and the paramilitary forces, called the paras.

The character of this struggle has been influenced by an even broader alliance between the multi-national corporations, U.S. government, Colombian government, and paras against both the guerrillas and independent organizations in civil society representing campesinos, unions, youth organizations, peace-oriented churches, and human rights activists. In addition, the introduction of the coca as a crop in rural areas during the 1970s created a source of income for the campesinos, whose legal crops could not compete with subsidized agriculture in global market, and for fueling the armed conflict. Both the guerrillas and paras have taxed the coca growers to maintain their armies. However, according the Felix Posada, the director of the Center for Latin American Popular Communication, most of the profit from Colombian cocaine production has gone to seven Mexican narco-trafficking cartels.

Colombian youth: Killers, cannon fodder and the Fifth Commandment

Both the legal and illegal armed groups in Colombia have relied on the youth to be their killers and cannon fodder. A growing number of churches and youth groups are resisting the recruitment of youth to the battlefields. The Mennonite Church, which invited the Christian Peacemaker Teams to Colombia, has been at the forefront of a conscientious objector movement. At Justapaz, the Christian Center for Justice, Peace and Nonviolent Action in Bogota, we learned that the CO movement is part of broader strategies to prevent violence, heal those who have suffered from violence, and create communities and churches devoted to nonviolent approaches to conflict resolution. The CO movement is also spreading throughout the country and networking on national and international levels. As a Mennonite in the United States, one member of our delegation has been active in international campaigns initiated by Colombian churches.

In 1991 Colombia ratified a new constitution that for the first time established freedom of religion and the right to freedom of conscience. However, this same constitution also required military service for young men. Conscientious objectors have claimed that freedom of conscience must include the right to choose not to kill. The Colombian constitutional court has not yet accepted this legal interpretation. Regulations for implementing peacetime service include a number of exemptions, including those who are involved in religious studies, students, parents, and those who have been displaced by war.

We heard from many Colombians that enlistment often does not proceed according to the regulations. Through extra-legal channels, young men from wealthy families are able to buy military registration cards while avoiding military service. In contrast, Colombians from working class and poor families may serve even if they are exempt because they are not informed about the law or their families are afraid that asserting their rights will lead to retribution by the government.

While we were visiting Barrancabermeja, the port city on the Magdalena River where the Colombia CPT team is housed, we learned that several CPT activists had recently witnessed youth being illegally recruited. After rounding up young men without military ID cards in working class neighborhoods, the soldiers sequestered them in a local battalion and presented them papers to sign for their enlistment without informing the youth of the legal exemptions. In one case, an organizer in the Fifth Commandment, the local CO group, informed the other youth of their exemptions while being driven to the battalion on a Friday; they all managed to be released the following Monday after proving that they were exempt.

The economy of Barrancabermeja (also called Barranca) is dominated by oil and large-scale cattle industries. The official reverence for the oil industry is expressed by an impressive metal statue of Cristo Petroleo in the middle of a lake in front of the state oil refinery. From the mid-1960s until 1998, guerrilla groups controlled the city. In 1998, the paras began conquering the city block by block with massacres and assassinations. Now Barranca is one of the most militarized cities in Colombia, with each branch of the Colombian military represented. Despite the strong military and paramilitary presence, unions, youth groups, human rights organizations, and women's groups in Barranca continue to be active.

Our delegation was inspired by the talent, compassion, feisty humor, and creative actions of the youth in Barranca. During September, the month prior to our arrival, the paras issued death threats listing the names of 150 youth in Barranca. Considering themselves the moral police of society, the paras target not only their political opposition, but also anyone they consider unconventional or deviant. After a youth was shot in front of the meeting place of the "League of Affection," one of the youth groups, a coalition of youth planned a four-day "Festival of Life" in working class neighborhoods, where the targeted youth live. The festival highlighted the natural beauty of the diverse Colombian youth with the symbol of butterflies. There are thousands of different kinds of butterflies in Colombia. The cultural events, which included music, dance and drama, lasted late into the night, demonstrating the youth's refusal to be ruled by the fear generated by the death threats. On the final night, young men and women performed a "Dance of Life," demonstrating how narco-trafficking, racism, and armed conflict were restricting their lives and the power of creative resistance and solidarity to transform their communities into life-affirming places. In response to threats against gay youth, the coalition chose a gay man to be one of their MCs.

League of Affection and jungle cheers

We visited many inspiring organizations serving youth and children that used dance, drama, art, and human rights education as foundations for creating a culture based on respect for diversity, solidarity, and nonviolence. One of the highlights of our delegation was our gathering with the League of Affection, which is particularly creative in its use of "alternative language for creating peace and harmony." Their strategies of inclusion transform ordinary space and time into rituals of solidarity infused with expressions of the joy of life. Youth from the League of Affection accompany those who are threatened by armed actors, organize projects to protect the environment and endangered species, and bring laughter to fearful, displaced children and people with terminal illnesses. This youth group collaborated with a union leading a boycott of Coca Cola to organize a Concert for Life, which called for the multinational corporations to leave Colombia. They brought in Colombian bands from Bogota and provided traditional Colombian food and an indigenous home brew made from corn. When the youngest member of our delegation shared that she is involved with collective dance projects with youth in the United States, our hosts responded with a raucous cheer, imitating the sounds of animals in the jungle. They explained that this cheer is a reminder of our natural place within the animal kingdom.

Poverty in earthly paradise

Our delegation's visit to two villages along the Opon River, Niequez and Florida, reinforced our connection to the natural world. Our pre-delegation instructions had prepared us for protecting ourselves from the intense sun rays and bellicose mosquitoes. However, nothing could prepare us for the incredibly beautiful land, lush fruit trees, and courageous, open-hearted people whom we met. The lack of electricity, plumbing, and running water forced us to change our taken-for-granted daily rhythms.

The first task of CPT in Colombia was to accompany the people of Nieques and Florida back to their homes along the Opon River in 2001. The previous year they had been displaced to Barranca after the paras had murdered members of their communities. The people continued to be afraid because paras, who accused them of feeding the guerrillas, forbid them from bringing food from Barranca to their villages. In 2004, the two communities set up meetings with both the guerrillas and paras to make some agreements so that they would be able to live in peace. Since that time, they have felt safer but continue to face other challenges. They had to pressure the government to provide their children a school teacher.

Nearly half of the 20 families who returned to their riverside homes left again because of their precarious economic situation. The communities have been working with the Magdalena Medio Peace and Development Programme, which they call the Programa, to improve their economic conditions. However, many of the remaining villagers complained that the development projects had become more burdensome than helpful. For example, they were sent chickens whose beaks had been clipped so they had to eat special feed that the campesinos cannot afford. They were also sent cacao trees at the wrong time for planting, and most of them died. The promise of water buffalo has never been realized. In general, the campesinos thought that the Programa was trying to get them to commit their time to planning long-term projects while they lacked the resources to survive even in the short-term. CPT is now re-evaluating the kinds of support that they can offer these communities.

Liberating life at the entrance to war

After our delegation returned to Barranca, we planned a public action in support of the youth movement's campaigns against military recruitment for armed groups. Inspired by the youth's creation of an "alternative language," we used the recruitment truck image, but with a different meaning. On our large cardboard truck was painted in Spanish:

"No! Recruitment for War!"

"Yes! Recruitment for Life!"

A creative Colombian CO and the full-time CPT team served as advisors to help us to create a pamphlet about the legal exemptions to military service and the legal grounds for conscientious objectors to refuse to serve in the military. As we hauled our truck downtown on the back of a pick-up, people stared with curiosity and amazement. Downtown we walked through the streets to the beat of our homemade drums while distributing our pamphlets. When we arrived at the battalion where illegally recruited men were sequestered, we performed street theater portraying the liberation of military recruits by the recruitment truck for life. It was exciting to see our articulate media spokesperson on the national TV news shortly after our action. The following day our jaunty green truck appeared on the front page of the Barranca newspaper. We were pleased to find out that the Sunday paper not only covered our theatrical action, but also included the information about illegal recruitment and legal exceptions to mandatory service.

Be not afraid of life and death

Important aspects of our delegation were working with many thoughtful and dedicated activists, including the full-time CPT team, and learning about the practicalities of becoming effective peacemakers. The team shared that they struggle with an inherent racist principle that makes accompaniment helpful to Colombian activists who are dedicated to nonviolence. Because the Colombian government is concerned with its relationships with the United States and Canada, the military is less likely to kill those from these countries than Colombians, especially those who are living in isolated rural areas. The team also has to weigh whether or not their own actions may lead to deportations, which would prevent them from carrying out their solidarity work. CPT Colombia includes people from the United States, Canada, and Colombia, and they have to take into consideration the fact that those from Colombia are taking greater risks than the others. In addition, many on the team are coping with issues that go beyond short-term courageous nonviolent interventions. For example, how do activists challenge racism and sexism within their own group, and what are strategies for continuing work as Christian Peacemakers while raising a family?

On our last night together in Bogota, Rev. Dan led us in a closing circle. Dan reminded us that our solidarity work must begin with our recognition of our own complicity with the crimes of the empire. He read from the words of the Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero, who offers a very different understanding of Christianity than the image of Cristo Petroleo protecting Colombia's oil refinery. Archbishop Romero accepted his inevitable martyrdom for his accompaniment of the poor and his order to the military to stop the repression. He said,

Martyrdom is a grace that I don't believe I merit. But if God accepts the sacrifice of my life, may my blood be the seed of liberty and sign that this hope will soon become a reality. May my death, if it accepted by God, be for the liberation of my people and a testimony of hope in the future.

In his last homily on March 23, 1980, Archbishop Romero pled,

In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people, whose cries rise to the heavens, every day more tumultuously, I ask you, I beg, I order you in the name of God: stop the repression.

We then shared bread and a cup of grape juice, reminding us of the sacrifices of the many martyrs and our capacity for renewal. Our journey together in Colombia was ending, and it was time now to let the spirit of hope, even in the face of a 40 year war, carry us home and guide us on the next steps of our journeys.

Members of CPT's September 26-October 9 Colombia delegation were Carolyn Berry (Town and Country, Missouri), Nathan Buchanan (Philadelphia,Pennsylvania), Dan Dale (Chicago, Illinois), Aine Donovan (Akron, Ohio), Christine Downing (Breton, Alberta), Monica Haas (Monroe, New Jersey), Beth Harris (Ithaca, New York), Amanda Jokerst (St. Louis, Missouri), and Morris Trimmer (Lexington, Virginia).