Colombia: Massive forced displacement of the Wiwa people of the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta

27/02/2024
Press release
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Organización Wiwa Yugumaiun Bunkuanarrua Tayrona (OWYBT)

The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), the Wiwa Yugumaiun Bunkuanarrua Tayrona Organisation (OWYBT), the Centro de Investigación y Educación Popular (CINEP/PPP), the Colectivo de Abogados y Abogadas "José Alvear Restrepo" (CAJAR) and the Asociación Interamericana para la Defensa del Ambiente (AIDA) strongly condemn the serious acts of forced displacement of the Wiwa people in the Sierra Nevada.

Riohacha, La Guajira, 27 February 2024. The organisations denounce and strongly reject, through an urgent alert, the forced and massive displacement of hundreds of indigenous Wiwa people.

FIDH and the undersigned organisations, accompanying the Wiwa indigenous people of the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta, beneficiaries of precautionary measures granted on 4 February 2005 by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), issue this urgent alert to inform the national and local authorities of the situation of forced and massive displacement of more than 300 indigenous people to the municipality of Riohacha (La Guajira) and other communities in the interior of the Sierra Nevada, including women and children, who have had to leave their territory as a consequence of the confrontations between armed groups.

Due to the imminent risk in which the Wiwa People of the Sierra Nevada find themselves, we request the national and local authorities to adopt, among other urgent actions, the necessary measures to protect the life and personal integrity of the members of the Wiwa People of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta.

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