CALCP: Welcome to a new accompanied organization

Article originally published in ColomPBIa 2 - February 2007

What were the reasons that encouraged you to found the Luis Carlos Pérez Lawyers Collective?

We had all recently graduated from university and had previous work experience with communities, the displaced population, youth, and peasant farmers. We didn´t want to carry out our profession in the traditional way; we wanted to be lawyers serving the people, to practice law in an alternative manner and, above all, accompany social and community causes. At the time, Bucaramanga had become a receiving zone for people forcibly displaced from Magdalena Medio, Catatumbo and Arauca. That is, the zone was undergoing a serious humanitarian crisis, and there was no organization in the region that accompanied social organizations and NGOs, from a legal perspective, in their defense of human rights.

Why did you decide to seek international accompaniment from PBI?

Over the years, our risk has increased considerably because of the causes we accompany, the zones we work in and our position on the defense of human rights. We knew of the work and PBI´s commitment to other human rights NGOs, which led us to explore the possibility of requesting this accompaniment. You work in regions that are suffering serious humanitarian crises, focusing on the defense of political prisoners, the displaced population, and criminalized social and community leaders. What are the greatest difficulties you encounter in your work? We move within zones under considerable paramilitary, social, economic, political and military control. The State is disinterested in carrying out its obligations, in particular regarding the protection of human rights. In addition, the antisocial and criminal policies of the current government; the open and concealed complicity of the State and its security agencies in the violation of human rights make our work even more difficult, causing labeling, persecution and a general increase in oppression against us.

CALCP advises and accompanies a process of resistance and provides defense of indigenous territory for the Motilón Bari Pueblo in Catatumbo who oppose the presence of oil companies in their territories. How would you define the current panorama of this process and what are the greatest challenges for 2007?

Violation of the rights of the Pueblo Bari has been open, evident and verified, as have the threats to their survival, ethnic integrity and culture. However, the State, through the appropriate agencies, has not responded to the complaints, appeals and solicitations of the indigenous people. To protect themselves, the Pueblo Bari implemented legal actions, strengthened their organization, carried out training and acted through political advocacy, visibility and denouncement. This led to the suspension of oil and seismic explorations. However, we believe that this interruption is more closely linked to the interest in starting fumigations in this strategic zone in order to guarantee displacement and plundering of lands for the eventual return of explorations and exploitations.

How do you evaluate the government´s response to the situation of displacement and violence in the northeast of the country?

 There has been no kind of response and the little attention they have paid is through the use of funding received from international cooperation. It is clear that this situation has been abandonded, even the Constitutional Court has said that, first of all, the State is not aware of  the dimensions of the problem, second, it doesn´t have sufficient resources to address the problem and finally, it doesn´t coordinate attention to displaced population with local bodies and institutions, nor does it invite the local population to participate. This is a region where paramilitaries have an open presence, using the name Ã?guilas Negras. The State has an interest in exploiting the natural resources and installing mega-projects in the region, not in protecting human rights.