It took over fourteen hours of travel for the U’wa Nation delegates to arrive to Bogotá, Colombia, to attend the scheduled meeting with the representatives of the Colombian Government.  Over thirty community members, many highly respected leaders and elders, traveled all the way to the capital to participate in the meeting to address unresolved issues in an agreement formulated between the U’wa and the Government last year. However, when not a single high ranking government official was willing to participate in the dialogue, the U’wa walked away from the meeting.

 

More than a year ago, the U’wa people sat down with this same government and reached a number of agreements to address the effects of oil exploration and subsequent violence around the Ecopetrol’s Caño Limón – Coveñas oil pipeline. A pipelines that runs through their ancestral territory. Tuesday’s meeting was to follow up on the agreements of May 1, 2014 and June 6, 2014, but the government remains unwilling to follow up on their agreed commitments.

The U’wa Nation also reported gross ignorance and disrespectful treatment of community elders and leaders during the meeting.

ERI has been working closely with the U’wa Nation. We, and many other members of the international community, are determined to remain vigilant until the Colombian Government follows through with their part of the agreement.