IPS-English COLOMBIA: Kankuamo Indians Count Their Dead - in Date: Thu, 10 Aug 2006 14:58:10 -0700 X-Nohoney: yes white-hard - relay H=adsl-63-203-231-61.dsl.snfc21.pacbell.net (borg.energy-net.org) [63.203.231.61] X-Sender-Host-Address: 63.203.231.61 X-Sender-Host-Name: adsl-63-203-231-61.dsl.snfc21.pacbell.net X-Spam-Class: HAM-VERY-WHITELIST ROMAIPS LA HD IP PR CS CV IN=20 COLOMBIA: Kankuamo Indians Count Their Dead - in Photos Constanza Vieira - Special to IPS AT=C1NQUEZ, Cesar, Colombia, Aug 10 (IPS) - Every Kankuamo community memb= er killed by armed groups in Colombia's civil war has a name, a face and = a story. And each one of them can be found in the pages of a new book pub= lished by the indigenous group that calls the remote northern Sierra Neva= da de Santa Marta mountain chain home. =94They were good people -- and innocent,=94 says the woman who has serve= d me a bitter coffee in her front yard, where we sit under an almond tree= that casts its protective shadow between us and the mid-day heat. She lo= oks up and closes the book =94Hoja de Cruz=94, which still bears the scen= t of fresh ink.=20 For a full 17 minutes, she has been reading out loud the names of dead Ka= nkuamo community members, which appear, one by one, below their respectiv= e photographs. =94Everyone who was killed is in here,=94 the woman tells = a neighbour who has been drawn by curiosity.=20 Since 1982, the community's violent death toll has climbed to 342 -- 234 = were killed since 1999. Seventy-one Kankuamo Indians were murdered in 200= 3 alone.=20 Of the total killings, 138 took place in At=E1nquez, the main town in the= reservation of the Kankuamo people, who number 13,000. They are one of C= olombia's 94 native peoples, who together represent one million of the co= untry's population of 44 million. The slaughter dropped off significantly following protective measures ord= ered in 2004 by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. Last year six m= embers of the Kankuamo community were killed, and none have been murdered= so far this year. The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountains are the ancestral home of some= 50,000 indigenous people, belonging to four ethnic groups: Arhuaco, Kogu= i, Wiwa and Kankuamo. Just 42 kilometres from the Caribbean Sea, the snowy peaks rise up to 5,7= 75 metres high. In 2002, part of this pristine region was declared a Bios= phere Reserve by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural = Organisation.=20 The mountain chain forms a sort of three-sided pyramid. The Kankuamo live= on the lower south-east face, and the water in that area is considered =94= strategic=94 for Valledupar, capital of the department (province) of Cesa= r, a 90-minute drive from At=E1nquez. The woman -- who we'll call Luisa -- is in her forties. She reads =94Hoja= de Cruz=94 calmly and almost without stumbling, while the desert breeze = =66rom the nearby La Guajira Peninsula flutters the pages of the book, su= btitled: =94A historical memory of the impact of the armed conflict on th= e Kankuamo indigenous people=94. Some pictures help her put a name to a face, others elicit comments such = as =94Oh, they killed him too?=94=20 The 241-page book lists no author, and the Kankuamo people are referred t= o as =94us=94. The lists, photos and brief summaries of how each person w= as killed, and who was responsible for their deaths, run on for 150 pages= =2E =94But they have already killed us, and nothing can change that. So what = is the point of remembering? What should we do with the guilty ones?=94 a= sks a Kankuamo elder in the introduction. =94We have to help them recogni= se the horror of what they have done, so they do not do it again,=94 answ= ers another.=20 Luisa comments on some of the photos as she continues to read names. =94T= his man was really helpful and friendly=E0This one was a teacher, a very = nice man. This boy was very special. =94Basically all of these people were good people. They didn't kill bad p= eople here. They were all killed because they were supposedly guerrillas,= but the guerrillas mainly keep to themselves and mind their own business= up in the mountains,=94 she says. Actually, the rebels, who took up arms in 1964, have also reportedly kill= ed members of the Kankuamo community. According to =94Hoja de Cruz=94, th= e Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) -- the main insurgent gro= up -- killed 68, and the smaller National Liberation Army (ELN) took down= 16. In September 2003, the ELN kidnapped eight foreign backpackers in the mou= ntains; one escaped, and the rest were released in November and December = in exchange for a truth commission in which the Catholic Church and Colom= bia's ombudsman co-operated on a report describing the humanitarian crisi= s in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. The publication of =94Hoja de Cruz=94 was financed by the United States A= gency for International Development (USAID), which handles the =94humanit= arian component=94 funds of Plan Colombia, a U.S.-financed counter-insurg= ency and anti-drug strategy. Colombia is the third largest recipient of U= .S. military aid, after Israel and Egypt. The book goes on to blame ultra-rightwing paramilitary groups for 190 kil= lings, and state security forces for 16. Nine are blamed on common crimin= als, and in 40 of the murders, no killers are identified. And how many children have lost their parents? =94You can just imagine. T= here are so many just in this neighbourhood -- all of them little ones. I= n my family four girls are in that situation,=94 she says. She points to = a six-year-old who has wandered up, the daughter of her younger brother, = a teacher. =94She was left without her father while still in the womb.=94= =20 =94He went to sign a contract and they were waiting for him along the way= ,=94 she says.=20 The paramilitaries =94killed anyone who opposed them. They would say, 'we= 're going to kill so-and-so,' and then they would. Campesinos, workers, e= mployees, teachers, women who were never involved in anything=94 (in no a= rmed group), although some Kankuamo Indians are known to be active guerri= llas and others serve with the paramilitaries. =20 A pink-clad girl, who looks about five but is seven, enters the house qui= etly. Her mother was killed three years ago. =94They were riding together= on a bus, and they (the paramilitaries) took the girl and handed her to = the other passengers, dragged her mother off and killed her right there. = The poor little thing lives with that image in her head.=94 The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an Organisation of America= n States body, ordered precautionary measures to protect all members of t= he Kankuamo indigenous community in September 2003. In July of the following year, after 32 more killings, the Inter-American= Court of Human Rights invoked stronger provisional measures that ordered= the Colombian government to protect the Kankuamo ethnic group. The townspeople cannot explain what these measures entail; they just know= that there have been fewer killings, and families who had left have begu= n to come back.=20 Yet the colourful playground in At=E1nquez remains deserted, surrounded b= y green bags of sand stacked in trench-like walls by the police, who retu= rned to the community after a 12-year-absence. Who plays in the park? =94= Who else? The police,=94 answers Juan Carlos, another local resident. Furthermore, against the wishes of local native authorities, a military b= ase has been established on the indigenous reservation, alongside the are= a's only high school, which is shared by the communities of Chemesquemena= and Guatapur=ED, two of the 12 Kankuamo towns. The base was built on top of a stone sacred to the four Sierra Nevada ind= igenous groups. From that spot, it overlooks the Kankuamo territory valle= y that fans out eastward, revealing semi-barren swaths of land, razed by = decades of deforestation and erosion. =20 More than 82 percent of the Sierra Nevada's primary forest has been destr= oyed, according to the Pro-Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta Foundation, estab= lished in 1986 by former environment minister Juan Mayr. The security forces continue to label members of the Kankuamo community a= s =94guerrillas.=94 In August 2005, when leftwing insurgents attacked a p= olice convoy on the borders of the reserve and killed 15 police officers,= 50 indigenous people were arrested in reprisal, several of whom are stil= l in prison.=20 ***** + At=E1nquez butchershop, where many local victims of the killings were s= eized - photo credit: Erik Arellana/IPS (http://www.ipsnoticias.net/fotos= /especiales/carnekank.jpg) + At=E1nquez central plaza - photo credit: Erik Arellana/IPS (http://www.= ipsnoticias.net/fotos/especiales/pzappalAtanquez.jpg) + Kankuamo temples in Guatupir=ED - photo credit: Eric Arellana/IPS (http= ://www.ipsnoticias.net/fotos/especiales/Kankguatapuri.jpg) + Fundaci=F3n Pro Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta - in Spanish (http://www.prosierra.org/index.htm) + COLOMBIA: Kankuamo Indians Have Paid High Price in Blood (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=3D34301) + RIGHTS-COLOMBIA: Gov't Ordered to Respond to Indigenous Cry for Help (http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=3D24624) + Indigenous Peoples =FB IPS special coverage (http://www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/indigenous_peoples/index.asp) (END/IPS/LA PR HD CS IP IN CV/TRASP-SS-SW/CV/DCL/06) =20 =3D 08102147 ORP012 NNNN