Wayuu Appeal for International Support in Wake of Massacre
Deidre d’EntremontDate: 06/11/2004
Wayúu indigenous people from Alta Guajira region of Colombia have asked for international help in the wake of a brutal attack on the town of Bahía Portete.
Roughly 150 armed men arrived at 7:30 a.m. on April 18 and surrounded the town. According to Amnesty International, the paramilitaries interrogated children while the men were out fishing or at work, killing some and torturing others to determine the whereabouts of their parents. At least 12 people are dead and 30 more have disappeared, 20 of them minors. Wayúu authorities say they requested help from the government three days before the massacre, but their cry went unheeded.
A commission coordinated by the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC) and made up of representatives from ONIC, the Ombudsman's office, the Colombian office of the
http://www.unhcr.ch/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/home >U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and several regional indigenous organizations visited the region beginning May 22 and verified reports of the massacre. To date, only three bodies and parts of a fourth have been found. Residents claim that the majority of the victims were burned.
Various news organizations report that between 400 and 2,000 people have now fled their homes in the Guajira as a result of the massacre. Venezuelan authorities have created humanitarian and security commissions and a registry office for refugees, reported Actualidad Etnica in May. Wayúu ties to communities in Venezuela have eased the refugee situation—refugees have dual nationality if they display a command of Wayunaiki, the Wayúu language—but have created the fear that the Colombian government will see refugees as a security threat.
More:
http://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/deidre-d-entremont/wayuu-appeal-international-support-wake-massacre~~~~~Colombian Indigenous people still being massacred
Debora Barros is a Colombian indigenous leader, lawyer and member and representative of the Wayuu community, which is the largest indigenous nation in Colombia.
She is a survivor of a massacre which occurred in April 2004 when a group of paramilitaries arrived in the lands where the earth where the indigenous community of Debora's family is located. In front of the community they assassinated and butchered 12 people (children and adults) and took away another 30. Altogether, 42 people died in that massacre. Amongst those butchered was the Debora's family. She was able to survive.
After the murders, the paramilitaries threatened the rest of the indigenous community telling them that if did not leave that land immediately, they would kill them in the same way. The tribe was completely displaced and they are now hiding in Venezuela.
Colombia's mining union, SINTRAMINERCOL is investigating this massacre, as the lands of the Wayuu nation are precisely located in territory which has the richest coal deposits in the whole of Latin America, that are operated and exploited by BHP Billiton and two other multinationals. What is happening to the Wayuu people is typical of what has been happening to indigenous and rural communities in Colombia. Their lands are of interest to multinationals; they are 'moved off' their land often by violent means by paramilitary groups - and then a couple of years later, the multinationals can expand their activities in those lands.
At the moment there are more than 3 million Colombians (farming, indigenous and black communities) who are internally displaced. After these displacements, a great part of the lands they were forced to abandon were soon occupied by diverse multinationals for the operation and export of natural resources, like gold, oil, coal, etc.
http://archive.amieu.net/vic.amieu.asn.au/pages645b.html~~~~~Drug Barons Massacre Colombian Indians in Trafficking Row
Gaëlle Sévenier, Free-lance Reporter
Juin 14th - 20th 2004 -Publication: The Big Issue in the North,
Great Britain
Hundreds of Wayuu Indians have been displaced after a violent massacre recently took place in the Guajira region of Colombia.
The massacres of what is estimated to be 100 Wayuu Indians by Colombian drug traffickers and paramilitaries has seen hundreds more Wayuu Indians flee over the border into Venezuela where they are now living in fear and poverty.
Maria Pinallo, a 40 year old Wayuu Indian, once lived raising goats with her six children in Bahia de Portee, a little port in the Guajira desert of Colombia. Three years ago, Jose Maria Borros, a.k.a. 'El Che Mabala", increased drug trafficking in the port. "A drug factory was built, planes would land there, many foreigners came to buy contraband," tells Maria. "When the wind would blow hard, our children would get sick from the citric acid and all the ingredients they put in cocaine. News of the indigenous families´ complaints soon found its way to El Che Mabala. One morning, they came with the Paramilitaries to exterminate us."
On April 18th, at 7am, approximately 200 armed men surrounded the 50 ranches of Bahia Portete. "In the desert, we can see people coming from far away, which saved our lives," explains Maria. She didn't have time to close her door or to take anything. She grabbed her youngest child in her arms and told everyone to run as fast as they could. Many didn't have time to escape.
Jose Vincente is only 8 years old. His mother told him to run and hide otherwise they would kill him. "I was running so fast... the sand was coming in my eyes... I was blinded" says the child. "I didn't have time to put my shoes on - my feet were hurting me so much." Jose Vincente draws in the sand how he escaped from the paramilitaries. He is certain that "they had my name on a list, they wanted to kill me…" The young boy describes the paramilitaries he saw as all wearing moustaches and military suits with 40 buttons. He saw them killing men, women and children without mercy, decapitating them, cutting them in pieces, "like raw meat with their machetes". He also reported seeing people being burned alive.
More:
http://gsevenier.online.fr/massacrescolombiaENGBigIssue.htm
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