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Canada to spend up to $5 billion on 12 armed drones

By
Brent Patterson
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On August 12, Vice reported: “The Canadian government is finally forging ahead with plans to set up its own fleet of armed drones, joining several of its NATO allies.”

“In a briefing for industry players, a representative from the procurement arm of the Canadian government laid out Canada’s desire for its long-range, medium-altitude drone. The total cost for the program could range from $1 billion to $5 billion.”

“It looks increasingly likely that Canada will be buying something resembling the MQ-9 Reaper, a preferred plane for the U.S. armed drone program.”

“[San Diego-based] General Atomics is proposing Canada buy the MQ-9B SkyGuardian—a successor to the MQ-9 Reaper and the MQ-1 Predator, which became synonymous with the Obama administration’s overseas drone operations.”

The article adds that the first drones would arrive by 2024 and be operational in 2025.

Vice has previously reported that “the Royal Canadian Air Force is hoping to get as many as 12 drones” and that they could be used to fire Hellfire missiles and drop laser-guided bombs on targets in Afghanistan, as well as do fly-overs of G20 summits in this country.

The Air Force says that drones could “conduct surveillance of the Summit site security zone, report activities that may threaten security, assist in the monitoring of crowds and access control, and record data for legal purposes.”

Overall, the Canadian government has committed to increase spending on the military from $18.9 billion in 2016-17 to $32.7 billion in 2026-27, with total spending over a 20-year period of $553 billion on a cash basis.

In June, Canada spent $1.1 billion on 50 Sidewinder AIM-9X Block II Tactical missiles (manufactured by Raytheon), training missiles, radar units and other various equipment for Canada’s existing fleet of CF-18 fighter jets.

The Canadian government also intends to award a $19 billion contract in 2022 to one of three transnational arms companies that have now submitted bids to build 88 new fighter jets for the Royal Canadian Air Force. For more on this, please see our fact sheet Five reasons to say no to spending $19 billion on warplanes.

PBI-Canada welcomes the decision of Carleton University’s criminology institute to end placements with police forces and prisons

By
Brent Patterson
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On August 12, CBC reported: “Carleton University’s Institute of Criminology and Criminal Justice (ICCJ) is ending all student co-op placements with police forces and prisons next year.”

That article also notes: “Typically, some 80 third-year year criminology students are given co-op placements with Ottawa police, the RCMP, Correctional Service Canada and the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre.”

This 3-page letter from the faculty of the ICCJ explains: “Widespread protests in response to police violence aimed at Black, Indigenous, and racialized people in Canada have placed a renewed focus on the need for organizations to take concrete actions to address issues related to white supremacy, systemic racism, and settler colonialism.”

Global News adds: “The ICCJ will also be revising its curriculum to offer anti-racism workshops and has struck a faculty committee to identify ways to better support BIPOC students in the criminology department.”

That article highlights that the ICCJ will now offer placements that expose students to alternatives such as restorative justice with an anti-racism and anti-colonial focus.

Peace Brigades International recognizes the structures of violence, such as gender and other identity-based discriminations, and socio-economic exploitation, and accompanies at-risk human rights defenders who are in danger due to their activism.

PBI has been present in Colombia for more than 25 years doing that work following an invitation from Javier Giraldo.

In this 2-minute video produced by PBI-Colombia, Giraldo recalls: “The presence of the PBI aimed at trying out another model of protecting persecuted people, that wasn’t an armed model, with armed bodyguards, and at the beginning we called them ‘moral bodyguards’ because they were unarmed.”

PBI accompanies the Cerezo Committee, that was formed after the arrests, torture and detentions of the Cerezo brothers in maximum-security penitentiaries in Mexico; and COPINH in Honduras following the murder of Indigenous leader Berta Carceres.

We also accompany the Peaceful Resistance of Cahabón who have seen one of their leaders, Maya Q’eqchi activist Bernardo Caal, unjustly imprisoned in Guatemala; and is part of the Missing Voices network that draws attention to the high level of extra-judicial killings by the police of young Black men in the informal settlements of Kenya.

PBI-Canada welcomes the decision of the ICCJ and will ask them to explore with us opportunities that could contribute to learning about our model of unarmed protective accompaniment, our work with communities and defenders who challenge state violence, forced displacement, racism and other oppressions, and the broader issue of the criminalization of social movements.

PBI-Mexico accompanied Espacio OSC says the situation for defenders and journalists has worsened with the pandemic

By
Brent Patterson
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The Civil Society Organizations (OSC) Space (Espacio) for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists (Espacio_OSC) writes:

“More than 5 months after [the Mexican government] decreeing the first measures to face the SARS-CoV-2 health emergency, attacks and limitations against defenders and journalists not only persist but have worsened.

So far this year it has been documented that at least 10 human rights defenders were killed, mainly those who defended the environment, women’s human rights and the LGTB + population, as well as the murder of at least 2 journalists for their journalistic work.

In addition to the context of violence, it is worrying that during the health emergency, measures have been adopted that lead to a negative impact on the work of defending human rights and information [including] austerity policies, …the weakening of institutions responsible for guaranteeing and defending human rights, …militarization … that has the permanent Armed Forces for public security tasks, as well as the continuation of extractive projects…

The situation of women defenders [has also been] exacerbated…

According to figures from the National Network of Women Human Rights Defenders in Mexico, between January and June there were 574 attacks against 266 women defenders and 42 groups. …During the confinement, the defenders have been victims mainly of smear campaigns, intimidation and harassment, threats and restriction of freedom of expression.

Given this context, it has become clear that in Mexico there is no safe and conducive environment for the defense of human rights and freedom of expression.

For this reason, it is essential that the Mexican State implement a comprehensive protection policy to guarantee that those who defend our human rights and inform us, can exercise their work freely, with social recognition and the necessary physical, digital, psychosocial and legal conditions for their exercise.”

The full statement can be read in Spanish here.

Espacio_OSC is a coordination platform of 18 civil society organisations from throughout Mexico. The Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project provides accompaniment and technical support to the platform.

This May 2012 report by the accounting firm Deloitte noted: “Canada represents 75% of the total foreign investment related to the mining sector in Mexico.” The report further noted: “Of the total foreign mining companies in Mexico, 73% are Canadian, representing 44% of Canada’s total investment in Mexico.”

In 2018, Canadian direct investment in Mexico totalled $22.5 billion.

PBI condemns the murder of Benoit Maria, “a great defender of the rights of the Maya” in Guatemala

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: Benoit Amedee Maria during a training with Ixiles de Quiché farmers. (Free Press Photo: Hector Lamb).

On August 11, the Peace Brigades International-Guatemala Project posted: “We also condemn the murder of Benoît Maria, the companion of the villages, and we express solidarity with his family and his friends.”

France 24 reports: “Benoit Maria, the Guatemala director of the agriculture and animal health NGO Agronomes et Veterinaires Sans Frontieres (AVSF), was shot in an indigenous area in the northeast of the country on Monday.”

“According to local media, Maria, who was 52, was driving a van on a road near the indigenous village of San Antonio Ilotenango, 85 kilometers (53 miles) northwest of the capital Guatemala City, when he was shot dead.”

“The murder was revealed on Monday by the Guatemalan Unit for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (UDEFEGUA).”

“He had lived in Guatemala for more than 20 years, supporting agricultural projects for the indigenous Mayan Ixil communities, according to UDEFEGUA coordinator Jorge Santos.”

“Maria also participated in the 2011 creation of Ixil University, in the department of Quiche, dedicated to the ancestral knowledge of indigenous people.”

UDEFEGUA stated: “We denounce the murder of this human rights defender, Benoît Maria.”

A statement from Maria’s organization AVSF noted: “He was murdered… while on his way to his workplace in indigenous communities. For more than 20 years [he] had been in charge of… defending the rights of peasants and indigenous communities.”

And Rigoberta Menchu described Maria as “a great defender of the rights of the Maya.”

The BBC adds: “Indigenous Maya people make up about half of Guatemala’s population, but rights campaigners say they face enduring inequality and discrimination.”

While the motive for the attack remains unknown, Prensa Libre reports that the District Prosecutor’s Office in Quiché has ruled out robbery given Maria’s belongings were not taken.

20 Minutes notes: “Guatemala’s Human Rights Defenders Protection Unit counted at least 157 attacks on activists in the country between January and April, and 462 in the whole of 2019, including 15 murders.”

PBI-Canada joins with PBI-Guatemala and many others in expressing sorrow for the murder of Benoit Maria and solidarity with all those who worked with him.

41 members of Congress from 8 parties back law that would ban fracking in Colombia

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: Senator Iván Cepeda Castro is one of the 41 members of Congress who back a proposed law that would ban fracking in Colombia.

On August 10, Semana Sostenible reported: “Environmentalists and congressmen came together today to present a bill banning the exploration and exploitation of non-conventional deposits of hydrocarbons in the Colombian territory with fracking, a technique that the national government has been insisting on.”

Amaylis Llanos of the Alliance for a Colombia Free of Fracking says: “There are three main reasons, the protection of the environment and health, to prevent the socio-environmental conflicts that the practice of this activity leaves behind and to contribute to the fulfillment of the goals of the Paris Agreement, which is the law [Law 1844 of 2017] of the Republic and to advance towards the energy transition.”

El Heraldo reports that there are 41 members of Congress from 8 political parties that support this legislation. Those parties include the Green Alliance, the Liberal Party, the Alternative Democratic Pole, the FARC Party, the U Party, Colombia Humana, Radical Change, and the Alternative Indigenous and Social Movement (MAIS).

The members of Congress supporting the legislation include: Iván Cepeda, Gustavo Petro, Angélica Lozano, Gustavo Bolívar, Juan Carlos Losada, Jorge Robledo, Roy Barreras, Julián Peinado, Aída Avella, Pablo Catatumbo, Mauricio Toro, Ciro Fernández, Antonio Sanguino, María José Pizarro and Fabian Díaz.

The social movements supporting this law include the Alliance for a Colombia Free of Fracking, the Podion Corporation, the Yariguíes Regional Corporation – Social Research Group into Extractives and the Environment in the Magdalena Medio Region (CRY-GEAM), and the National Water Network of Colombia.

Timeline

On June 11, Business News Americas reported: “Colombia is on track to award contracts for fracking pilots this year as the government fast tracks plans for unconventional oil and gas drilling, according to a senior energy official.”

That article quotes Armando Zamora, the head of national hydrocarbons regulator ANH, who says the contracts will be awarded in September or October.

Three Canadian companies are reportedly bidding for those contracts.

Toronto-based Sintana Energy and its subsidiary Patriot Energy Oil & Gas Inc. are reportedly part of a joint venture with ExxonMobil to frack the VMM-37 bock near Puerto Wilches, Santander. And Calgary-based Canacol Energy Ltd. and its subsidiary CNE Oil and Gas are reportedly partnered with ConocoPhillips to frack the VMM-2 and VMM-3 blocks near Puerto Patiño and San Martin, Cesar.

Last year, along with ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips and Ecopetrol, Colombian Mines and Energy Minister Maria Fernanda Suarez noted that Calgary-based Parex Resources was among the companies seeking to frack in Colombia.

It is expected that the fracking pilot projects will begin in 2021.

Peace Brigades International provides accompaniment to the Luis Carlos Perez Lawyers’ Collective (CCALCP) and the Regional Corporation for the Defence of Human Rights (CREDHOS). PBI-Canada and PBI-Colombia collaboratively organized an 8-day solidarity tour in Canada in November 2019 for three representatives from those organizations to raise their concerns about fracking with Members of Parliament, government officials, civil society allies, and a wide range of people at public forums.

Note

Prior to being elected to the Colombian Senate, Iván Cepeda Castro was a human rights defender. In this PBI-Colombia 25th anniversary video, Cepeda says: “Today I’m speaking here with you thanks to PBI. The paramilitary took me off a vehicle and there was a moment where if two PBI women hadn’t been with me, an Italian and a Norwegian, they probably would have made me disappear.”

Court revokes custodial arrest measure on two leaders prosecuted for protesting Toronto-based oil company in Colombia

By
Brent Patterson
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On November 27, 2018, more than 200 members of the Army and Police landed in San Luis de Palenque, Casanare, Colombia and charged eight local activists with a variety of criminal charges in relation to their protests against the harms caused by the operations of Toronto-based Frontera Energy in their community.

While we are waiting for more details (hopefully in the morning), the Social Corporation for Community Advisory and Training Services (COSPACC) has just tweeted: “The 2nd Mpal Criminal Court with functions of control of guarantees of #Yopal revoked the custodial arrest measure imposed on 2 of the 8 leaders prosecuted in the case of #SanLuisdePalenque. We demand the freedom of social leaders.”

And Fabian Laverde from COSPACC has also tweeted a short video clip (including the image at the top of this article) with the message: “The joy of a family case @FronteraEnergy upon hearing the decision of the 2nd Judge of Yopal with a guarantee control function. For the defense of life and permanence in the territories.”

PBI-Colombia accompanies both COSPACC and the Committee in Solidarity with Political Prisoners (CSPP) who have been working on this issue.

PBI-Canada has been supporting this by organizing Zoom meetings in Canada with Member of Parliament Paul Manly, civil society allies, and representatives from Global Affairs Canada and the Canadian Embassy in Colombia.

The issue of the eight social leaders was also raised by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders as outlined here.

Michel Forst highlighted: “In November 2018, Frontera Energy signed two agreements with the Ministry of Defence for a total of US$1,343,106 to secure army protection for its activities.” It was just days later that the social leaders were arrested.

More to come…

UPDATE: On August 11, Prensa Libre Casanare reported:

Free 2 social leaders of the Cubiro block. They were deprived of liberty for 20 months due to a complaint by Frontera Energy

Two social leaders prosecuted for participating in the protests against the oil project in the Cubiro block of the multinational Frontera Energy in San Luis de Palenque, were released after a hearing held yesterday in the Second Criminal Court for Guarantee Control.

After 20 months of being deprived of liberty, with the measure of house for jail, the judicial decision favored the engineer Miguel Ángel Rincón Santiesteban and Carmen Iraida Salcedo Gutiérrez.

The appeal was presented by criminal lawyer Juan Álvarez who at the end of the hearing reported that the revocation of the security measure was requested based on three elements used by the Prosecutor’s Office to carry out the criminal process, such as an intelligence report from the Army , some telephone calls and a confidential testimonial source, whose probative basis did not have sufficient support, since, for example, the Prosecutor’s Office waived the evidence of an alleged undercover agent.

Álvarez added that it was possible to demonstrate that Rincón Santiesteban and Carmen Iraida do not represent a danger to the administration of justice and that the Prosecutor’s Office was also asked to present the complaints against the two indicated in which threats were established against Frontera Energy employees , without a single being presented.

Among the evidence presented, a certification was issued by the Mayor of San Luis de Palenque, the Councilors and more than 150 people in the area that indicates that Rincón and Salcedo do not represent any risk to society, but, on the contrary are considered social leaders who sought the good of a general interest related to the environment and the fulfillment of obligations established in a list of requests, including job opportunities.

One of the major supports of the social leaders was a meeting held between the multinational, the Ministry of the Interior, the Departmental Government Secretariat, where the community demanded compliance with a series of items from the oil company, as they considered social impacts and were the State entities that mediated in said requests, which were ultimately breached by Frontera Energy.

For the same case, the former councilor of San Luis de Palenque, Ferney Salcedo, who is being held in the La Picota prison, continues to be deprived of liberty; Yulibe Leal, Jesús Leal Salcedo, Teresa Rincón Leal, Eliecer Rincón and Jerónimo Betancourt, who were captured in a cinematic raid operation in advance of their homes by the Police, and the CTI around 3:00 in the morning on November 27 while they slept on their farms, located in the Sinaí and Guarataro Valley estates of the Platanales, La Venturosa and El Tigre villages in the municipality of San Luis de Palenque.

The full article can be read in Spanish here.

Three Indigenous Kukuma killed at protest at Calgary-based PetroTal oil company site in Peru

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo from EFE.

Three Indigenous Kukuma were killed by Peruvian National Police late in the evening on Saturday August 8 at a protest at Calgary-based PetroTal’s Block 95 oil field in the town of Bretaña, Puinahua district, Requena province in Peru.

Several news articles also report that 11 other Kukuma were injured in the incident as well as 6 members of the security forces.

The incident reportedly began on Sunday August 2 when Kukuma took over a pumping station for a 100,000 barrel per day pipeline used by PetroTal (and other companies including Toronto-based Frontera Energy) to move crude from the Amazon jungle to the Port of Bayovar on the Pacific Coast of northern Peru.

PetroTal says: “As a result of the attack at Pump Station No.5, PetroTal had requested enhanced security at the Bretana field from Peru’s National Police.”

It appears the Kukuma wanted the Canadian company to stop its activities due to concerns about the influx of workers given the COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing concerns about environmental contamination from its operations.

La Mula reports: “For days there have been a number of actions by communities in areas affected by oil activity that demand that the state not allow crude oil production during the pandemic. These measures aimed to draw attention to both regional and central governments and prevent COVID-19 from spreading in their communities.”

The New York Post adds: “Local indigenous rights organization ORPIO [the Regional Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the Northern Amazon of Peru] said in a statement that natives of the area demand assistance from oil companies amid an outbreak of coronavirus infections in their Amazon communities.”

And Mongabay reports: “Ugkum Jempetf – who represents the Kukama communities of the Lower Puinahua community of Bretaña – recalled that in 2019 the people of Bretaña held several protests to ask the oil company to install water and light in their community, as well as to improve the basic conditions of their health centre…”

In terms of the deaths, Angus Media reports that Orpio has claimed it was PetroTal security guards who opened fire on the Kukuma.

That article also notes: “Peru’s interior ministry reported that around 70 people armed with spears and pellet guns surrounded the block”, while AFP reports the interior ministry says the Kukuma were “armed with shotguns”.

But Orpio says: “The indigenous brothers had no firearms. They only carried their arrows as a tool of ancestral defense, for traditional and cultural use…”

Red Muqui, a network of Peruvian organizations, has tweeted: “Orpio denounces the murder of 3 indigenous people on the outskirts of Lot 95 … after wanting to exercise the right of territorial control in protest at the abandonment of the State and 50 years of oil extraction that has contaminated territories. They don’t have water or medicine.”

Between January 21 and February 3 of this year, Michel Forst, at the time the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, visited Peru.

Forst stated: “I regret to conclude that a large number of human rights defenders, and especially indigenous people and local communities defending the environment and their human rights are not able to operate in a safe and enabling environment.”

And while his report predates this circumstance, Forst also noted: “I heard that security guards or police officers employed by oil and mining companies have at several occasions threatened to kill, harassed and attacked human rights defenders during peaceful protests.”

It is being reported that Orpio and other Indigenous organizations want an independent investigation of the violence at Block 95.

Above Ground has tweeted: “While observers in Peru call for an impartial investigation into the tragic incident, Canadian civil society continues to push for measures to hold companies like PetroTal to account here in Canada if their actions contibute to violent conflicts abroad.”

It adds: “A small step in that direction would be giving the [Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise] investigative powers, so we’d finally have a watchdog capable of finding out if a Canadian firm is engaged in wrongdoing abroad.”

Toolkit Organizers meet in Kawangware to discuss strategies for the elimination of sexual and gender-based violence

By
Brent Patterson
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On August 10, the Peace Brigades International-Kenya Project posted on Facebook: “The Women Human Rights Defenders Toolkit Organizers met today in Kawangware urban settlement to discuss sexual and gender-based violence as well as a joint strategy to contribute to the elimination of SGBV.”

Human Rights Watch has noted: “Violence is a daily reality for women and girls across Kenya. According to government data, 45 percent of women and girls aged 15 to 49 have experienced physical violence and 14 percent have experienced sexual violence. Many cases are not reported to authorities and few women get justice or receive medical care.”

Kawangware is an informal settlement with a population of about 291,565 people. It is situated about 15 kilometres west of Nairobi.

Reuters recently reported: “In Kawangware, there is scant access to water or the space for self-isolation. Families of five live in one-room shacks. There is no piped water and households share toilets. According to the United Nations, only 14% of Kenyans have the facilities to wash their hands at home with soap and water.”

PBI-Kenya developed the WHRD Toolkit in 2016. The Toolkit Organizers are community activists working for women’s and children’s rights in their communities.

PBI established the Kenya Project in December 2012.

PBI-Kenya draws attention to police violence in Kenya during the COVID-19 pandemic

By
Brent Patterson
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The Peace Brigades International-Kenya Project has encouraged people via Twitter to read at an article in the Kenyan newspaper The Star titled Protesting during a pandemic: Confronting civil rights abuses in Kenya.

Key excerpts from that article include: “Human Rights Watch reported that at least six people died from police violence during the first 10 days of the curfew meaning that by that time, the police had killed more people in Kenya than the virus which the curfew and other regulations were supposed to contain.”

“By 12th June, the Independent Police Oversight Authority (IPOA), a civilian oversight body on the work of the police in Kenya had received over 95 complaints since the curfew started. The complaints relate to deaths, assaults, shootings, sexual assaults, harassment and inhuman treatment among others. Investigation is still ongoing to establish if there is police involvement in each of these cases.”

“Calvin Omondi, Hamisi Juma Mbega, Yassin Moyo, Eric Ng’ethe Waithugi, Yusuf Ramadhan, Idris Mukolwe are just three of the more than 100 people reported to have been killed by police since January 2020 according to Missing Voices, a consortium of community, national and international human rights defenders committed to ending enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings in Kenya.”

“Missing Voices reports that 712 people have been killed by the police or reported missing since 2007 with only 26 having been charged with a crime for these cases which include enforced disappearances. These cases are more rampant in poorer neighbourhoods.”

To read the full article by Soila Kenya, please click here.

PBI-Kenya is part of the Missing Voices network and the Police Reforms Working Group network. It also works with the Mathare Social Justice Centre and Dandora Community Justice Centre as well as other social justice centres in Nairobi.

On July 7, PBI-Kenya expressed its concern about the 56+ human rights defenders arrested at the time of the Saba Saba march. The previous month, PBI-Kenya shared an opinion piece from The Star titled Police must stop killing, maiming the poor. And on March 28, PBI-Kenya condemned the police violence (including the firing of tear gas) at the Likoni Ferry Crossing in Mombasa hours before the COVID-19 curfew was imposed.

During the pandemic, PBI-Kenya has also profiled the community service of toolkit organizers Victor, Jecinter Agunja, Christopher Omoke, Grace Papa, and Editar Ochieng.

To follow PBI-Kenya on Twitter, please click here.

Toronto-based Lido Pimienta helps to raise pandemic relief funds for Indigenous Wayuu peoples in Colombia

By
Brent Patterson
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When Toronto-based artist-musician Lido Pimienta performed at a Pitchfork stay-at-home concert this past April, she chose to spotlight Fuerza de Mujeres Wayuu (Force of Wayuu Women), an organization that is currently raising funds to assist Indigenous Wayuu families in the department of Guajira, Colombia.

Pitchfork notes: “Born in Barranquilla, Colombia, and identifying as Afro-Colombian with indigenous Wayuu heritage on her mother’s side, Pimienta grew up amidst regional turmoil, ultimately informing her politicized approach.”

The Organización Nacional Indígena de Colombia (ONIC) has also endorsed the Fuerza de Mujeres Wayuu fundraising campaign.

If you are able to support this effort, please click on this GoFundMe page that is seeking to raise $10,000. The funds raised will help to deliver food to Wayuu families who cannot go to work because of the quarantine.

In terms of additional significant context, the Independent reported earlier this month: “Angelica Ortiz is from a Wayuu indigenous community in La Guajira, northern Colombia. She is part of the local activist group, Fuerza de Mujeres Wayuu, leading protests against mining and agribusiness projects.”

That article in the Independent specifies: “One of the major fights for the group is the coal-mining project El Cerrejon. The largest open-pit coal mine in Latin America diverted water from a stream that the Wayuu indigenous communities relied on for clean water and displaced many communities.”

Numerous groups including MiningWatch Canada have drawn attention to the fact that New Brunswick Power has been buying approximately 500,000 tonnes of coal from Cerrejón since the mid 1990s. Nova Scotia Power also imports coal from Cerrejon.

For a 1-minute Global Witness clip of Angelica speaking about the threats faced by land and environmental defenders in Colombia, please click here.

You may also want to check out Pimienta’s latest album ‘Miss Colombia’. Samaritanmag.com highlights: “The new LP deals with the pain that communities of colour and indigenous ancestry have experienced in societies seeded with racism and imperialist attitudes.” Notably, much of it was recorded in San Basilio de Palenque, a community founded by escaped slaves as a refuge in the seventeenth century.

To listen to “Eso Que Tu Haces” from that album, please click here.

And for more on the online fundraiser for the Solidarity Fund for Vulnerable Families in Colombia that Lido has organized, please click here.

Peace Brigades International has accompanied at-risk human rights defenders in Colombia since 1994. Last year, Colombia was the most dangerous country in the world for land and environmental rights defenders. PBI is working with Colombian activists to amplify their concerns about Canadian oil and gas operations in Colombia.

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