“Marmato: your coveted gold is the source of riches for strangers—and the cause of misery for yourselves.” —Old Marmateño saying.
 

Up a flight of stairs, behind double-enforced bulletproof glass and a large, silent bodyguard sits the office of Francisco Ramírez, a mining-policy researcher and president of Sintraminercol, Colombia’s state mineworkers’ union. Mining policy really isn’t sexy stuff and researching it usually isn’t a dangerous occupation, but some of Mr. Ramírez’s conclusions can mean life or death, both literally and figuratively. “Once they tried to kill me right here in this office,” said the researcher, who has survived seven assassination attempts.

Francisco Ramirez is President of SINTRAMINERCOL, the union representing workers in the Colombian state-owned mining company MINERCOL, and Secretary of FUNTRAMIENERGETICA, the federation of Colombian energy sector unions including the oil industry workers union USO, SINTRAMINERCOL, and SINTRAMIENERGETICA. He is also a member of the Human Rights Committee of the CUT union federation. Francisco is currently touring Britain, meeting with the NUM, UNISON, T&GWU, UNIFI, TUC (Wales), NWTUC. To arrange further meetings contact the Colombia Solidarity Campaign coordinator Richard Solly: