Such has been the lot of thousands of labor leaders, environmentalists, and public investigators in Colombia's oil-rich state of Casanare, where for decades British Petroleum and other multinationals have hired military groups to brutalize community dissent and shut down opposition to the most egregious models of their extractive economics.

January to March 2017
PBI’s quarterly human rights update calls attention to critical security situations affecting the persons, organisations and communities, accompanied by Peace Brigades International (PBI), whose work in the defence of human rights results in threats to their personal safety and to the work itself. This publication is of limited distribution and cannot be reproduced without prior authorisation.

To consult the document

Since February 15, 2017, communities in the municipalities of Yopal and Aguazul, in the department of Casanare, peacefully gathered and blocked a road opposite the oil block project El Porton, run by the Canadian oil company Gran Tierra. Since the beginning of the mobilization, social leaders have received threatening calls, have been followed by different vehicles and three have been charged for obstructing the transit way.

Regional Context

The Indigenous and Afro-Colombian community of Marmato won a major court victory in their 10-year fight against a massive Canadian gold mine.

In February 2017, Colombia's Constitutional Court ruled in favor of the residents of Marmato, a small Indigenous and Afro-Colombian community in the center of the country, in their 10-year fight against a massive open pit mine project by Canadian gold giant Gran Colombia Gold Corporation.