The Nonam community calls on Buenaventura District Government to comply with its engagements taken for their return to their territory, the security and dignity of the indigenous people. PUBLIC STATEMENT We, members of the NONAM Indigenous Community, of the Humanitarian and Biodiverse Reserve of Santa Rosa del Guayacán, forcefully displaced 13 months ago to the city of Buenaventura by a 2010 paramilitary incursion suffered in our territory of the Rio San Juan and Bajo Calima, make an emergency call in view of the critical situation into which the failure of District Government of Buenaventura has put us. This is a failure to guarantee us complete humanitarian protection as well as ensure us the proper specific treatment for indigenous people. This failure is compounded by the government’s denial of the means to ensure our free and voluntary return in conditions of security and dignity, and in accordance with the legal norms, and treaties and conventions signed and ratified by Colombia. We have already spent one year as displaced people, surviving in sub-human conditions of housing, food, health, education, unsanitary conditions and in conditions incompatible with the survival of our cultural identity. Many times, diseases induced by our poor living conditions have threatened the life of members of our community and, today, we are painfully mourning the deaths of two of our infant girls. No doubt the risk of other losses will materialize, if we continue to live in these dangerous conditions. In our desire to guarantee our return to our Reserve in good conditions, and, in view of the failure inflicted on us, by the Buenaventura District Committee for the Care of Displacement Victims, to proceed, on August 18 and 19, with the verification of our territory, as well as of the conditions of protection, the state of the residences, the planted fields and the seeds of food crops, we have decided to abandon our dialogue with the District Government and to look for a new space of dialogue, at the national level, to demand fulfilment of our rights of displaced persons and of our other requests concerning our return. Unable to live in the temporary refuge, yet lacking a response from the National Government, we decided to appeal directly to the national and international community to aid in our return on August 30, while, at the same time, continuing our urgent appeal to the National Government. We are grateful for the spiritual, political and humanitarian solidarity to guarantee our return to our territory, on the stated date. Yours Sincerely, HUMANITARIAN AND BIODIVERSE RESERVE, SANTA ROSA DE GUAYACÁN.