Translocal learning and the protection needs of environmental defenders, campesina and Indigenous communities in British Columbia and Colombia

Published by Brent Patterson on May 12, 2025May 12, 2025

Photos: Unist’ot’en territory in British Columbia; “La Perla Amazónica” Campesina Reserve Zone in Putumayo, Colombia.

Environmental defenders in the Putumayo region of Colombia and on Wet’suwet’en, Gitxsan and Gitanyow territories in Canada face a range of threats.

In December 2023, Amnesty International Canada highlighted: “A new report by Amnesty International traces the years-long campaign of violence, harassment, discrimination, and dispossession against Indigenous Wet’suwet’en land defenders resisting the construction of Coastal GasLink (CGL) liquified natural gas pipeline through their unceded ancestral territory without their free, prior and informed consent.”

The pending approval of the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission (PRGT) fracked gas pipeline brings the risk of a similar campaign against the Indigenous Gitxsan and Gitanyow peoples of northern British Columbia.

In September 2024, Amnesty International also noted they had “documented repeated threats, stigmatization and harassment against Jani Silva and ADISPA [the Association for the Integral Sustainable Development of the Amazon Pearl] since at least 2017, and the way in which this has affected their work to defend the rights of their community and their commitment to the conservation and monitoring of biodiversity and water in their territory.”

Whether it is a fracked gas pipeline on Indigenous territories in Canada or oil extraction and mining operations that impact campesina (small-farmer or peasant) and Indigenous (including Inga, Nasa and Siona) communities in Putumayo, these extractive megaprojects create a context of risk for environmental defenders.

The spectrum of risk includes verbal threats, harassment, criminalization, removal from territory and threats.

The actors include transnational corporations, private security, the police and army (security forces), the court system, and illegal armed actors (paramilitary groups).

The responses can include state protection mechanisms (like the National Protection Unit/ UNP in Colombia), unarmed civilian protection/ UCP (that can be provided by organizations such as Peace Brigades International), and community-based self-protection initiatives (including the Indigenous Guard in Putumayo or the “Cimarrona Guard” in the northern Cauca region that defend Afro-Colombian territories).

Questions:

1- What are the extractive megaprojects now being faced by environmental defenders, campesina communities and Indigenous peoples in Putumayo and the territories of the Wet’suwet’en, Gitxsan and Gitanyow peoples in British Columbia?

2- What does “land back” mean in British Columbia and Colombia?

3- What threats are faced by environmental defenders in Colombia and British Columbia? How are they the same? How do they differ?

4- What protection mechanisms are needed to enable them to continue to uphold their rights and do their work?

5- What are the similarities, what are the differences between what is experienced in British Columbia and Colombia? What can be learned from this?

6- How should states fulfill their obligations to environmental defenders? What are credible demands that could be made to transnational corporations in relation to this? What can international organizations do? How can communities organize to defend themselves? Can these all work together?

We hope to be able to help make space for “translocal learning” that recognizes the interconnectedness of peoples that transcends national (colonial) borders, emphasizes the links between localities, and fosters connection and strengthens solidarity through in-person visits and virtual exchanges.