PBI-Colombia accompanies the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó on the 28th anniversary of its formation

Published by Brent Patterson on March 31, 2025

PBI-Colombia has posted on Instagram:

“We congratulate the Peace Community for their anniversary, they have been 28 years of Resistance and Peace Building in the territory of Urabá. We were able to accompany them on March 23, on these special dates and always remembering Nalleli and Edinson whose case remains in complete impunity.”

The founding of the Peace Community

Yes! Magazine has reported: “On March 23, 1997, Brígida Gonzáles, 69, along with the others who decided to stay, founded the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó. This ‘Peace Community’ declared itself neutral in the conflict, pledging not to get involved in any way and asked to be left in peace.”

For Peace Presence has explained: “In the middle of the 1990s, as violence escalated and peasant farmers suffered from extrajudicial deaths at the hands of armed actors as well as forced displacements, the people began to organize themselves in order to return to their land and to escape from the spiral of violence.”

It adds: “Conscientiously objecting to the war and demanding their rights as civilians not to be involved in a conflict, the community denounced the use of arms within their territories and committed to a variety of principles in the process (including cooperative communal work, prohibition of alcohol, the non-use of illicit drugs, the no-entry of armed actors, non-use of weapons and the refusal to provide information to armed actors).”

The Peace Community is located more than 700 kilometres northwest of Bogota in the mountainous northern region in the department of Antioquia.

Nallely and Edinson

Last year, the El Colombiano newspaper reported: “Nallely and Edinson were murdered on Tuesday, March 19 at noon, the news reached Apartadó around 6 p.m. and the bodies were collected 24 hours later.”

Infobae also reported: “The region where this crime was perpetrated is mainly operated by the paramilitary Gaitanista Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AGC), also known as Clan del Golfo, the country’s largest criminal gang.”

On March 20, 2024, Colombian president Gustavo Petro posted: “Four hundred members of the community of Paz de San José de Apartadó have been murdered [since its founding], two days ago, the whole government was there in Apartadó and we met with members of the community in the Popular Assembly. On our return they assassinated two more community members. Dark forces want to reissue paramilitarism in the northwest of the country.”

Accompaniment

The Peace Brigades International-Colombia Project has accompanied the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó since 1999.