Fumigation

Tell the US to stop supporting the destruction of Colombian communities

This alert was originally released by Jenzera.

On March 16, 2010 several anti-narcotics police planes sprayed with chemicals the communal gardens and plots of the Eperara Siapidaara women of the Joaquincito Indigenous reservation, in the Naya River near the township of Puerto Merizalde (located in the municipality of Buenaventura, Colombia). These plots are located within walking distance of the Casa Grande, a Siapidaara religious and ceremonial center. The planes also sprayed the plots of their Afro-Colombian sisters from the Santa Cruz township who have joined the Eperara women in developing an agro-ecological production project. This project seeks to expand alternatives to a growing illegal coca economy. The growth of illicit crops is disturbing Colombia's Pacific coast rivers, and destroying traditional cultures, communal economies and sustainable ways of using environmental resources. The government disregarded the community's peaceful claims and sprayed their crops with even greater intensity. Several women were looking to move to the health post of Puerto Merizalde for medical care.

QUITO (Reuters) - Ecuador said on Monday it had sued Colombia in international court over drug crop fumigation along its frontier in reaction to a Colombian raid that killed a rebel leader across the border earlier this month.

The Colombian Department of Nariño is experiencing one of the worst protection and humanitarian assistance crisis since Colombian President Alvaro Uribe began his second term in office. The U.S. financed aerial herbicide spray program (fumigations) compounds and exacerbates the myriad of hardships that Afro-Colombian communities are already facing: racism, disadvantaged access to state programs, food insecurity due to the internal armed conflict, internal displacement and vulnerability to human rights violations by the armed groups.

Please join the U.S. Office on Colombia, Witness for Peace, the Washington Office on Latin America , Amnesty International and many more as we call on Congress to create a new policy on Colombia and as we commemorate those killed in the San Jose de Apartado massacre.

Ecuador will intercept any aircraft from Colombia or the United States that enter the country's air space, the country's President Rafael Correa told media on Wednesday.