a campaign for the freedom of Colombian political prisoners
Dear friends:
For your information, we have become aware of an incident involving our friend Kevin Neish, a Canadian human rights observer who is currently in Colombia visiting some political prisoners and observing the trial of Liliany Obando. Her public hearing scheduled for 18/19 & 27th January was cancelled because the “Fiscalia” (Prosecution) failed to provide a copy of the prosecution evidence against Liliany to her defense team. The case was adjourned until 15/16th February. Read more...
Human Rights Day for All, and for All, the Good Fight!!!
Statement by the International Network in Solidarity with the Colombian Political Prisoners
Human Rights Day Statement in Solidarity with Liliany Obando and All Colombian Political Prisoners
December 10
On this Human Rights Day, the International Network in Solidarity with the Colombian Political Prisoners (INSPP) calls attention to the violation of the human rights of Colombia's political opposition and its supporters. The Colombian government is waging a campaign to criminalize critical thinking-a campaign that paves the way for transnational access to Colombia's resources, underwritten with more than (US) $7 billion in the US funded Plan Colombia. Read full statement in International Campaign...
Pasto Girl,
is a song for Liliany Obando, a Colombian Political Prisoner held at the "El Buen Pastor, women's prison". freelilianynow has sent you a private track called PastoGirl. (Click here to listen)
Pasto Girl, music and vocals by Michelle Rumball, lyrics by Michelle Rumball and Roger Langen, adapted from a poem by Roger Langen. Find poem here.
We hope you enjoy it,
DENUNCIA PÚBLICA
El Estado colombiano reprime al Profesor Miguel Ángel Beltrán Villegas trasladándolo arbitrariamente Leer más...
Peace and Justice for Colombia
CALL FOR ACTION:
TO ALL DEFENDERS OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND PEACE LOVING PEOPLE
Peace and Justice for Colombia (PJFC) calls on you to protest recent actions by Australian and Colombian police agencies that violated the human rights and prisoner conventions of labour activist and political prisoner, Liliany Obando. We denounce the attempts by the Australian Federal Police (AFP) to obtain information on organizations and individuals that Ms Obando met while touring Australia. This is an attempt to internationalize the so-called FARC-Politics and criminalize international solidarity. [...]
Peace and Justice for Colombia believes that the use of Australian tax payers money by the AFP in this particular matter, not only violates the rights of a Colombian citizen which are guaranteed in the Colombian constitution but it also supports the Uribe regime’s attacks on the Colombian people in particularly the political opposition. This action attempts to criminalize the international solidarity expressed by Australian trade unionists, individuals and religious and community organizations. Rade more...
Read statements from Australian organisations...
Visit To Colombian Political Prisoner Liliany Obando
Commentary by James Jordan
Bogotá, Colombia, September 2009 - Liliany Obando is powerful. She is one thousands of Colombian political prisoners. For a year now, I have known Liliany through letters. We finally met face-to-face on three occasions, during a delegation sponsored by the U.S.-based Campaign for Labor Rights and the Colombia Action Network. I represented the International Network in Solidarity with Colombia’s Political Prisoners. Read more...
Letter to the Organisers of the Latin America Solidarity Conference, Melbourne
I have had two opportunities to participate in the conference of solidarity with Latin America and the Asia Pacific organised by yourselves and I can say with an awareness of these matters that it is more than the simple realization and attendance at an event. From my experience I can say that it has been a valuable tool for building bridges for communication, to exchange experiences of resistance, to strengthen ties of fraternity and solidarity and to launch concrete initiatives between the organisers, attendees and the organisations from the countries participating.
In the case of my country, Colombia, the existence of a prolonged internal social and armed conflict, results in it being less attractive for many solidarity activists. In the space of this conference we can make known our reality, our struggle and resistance, our dreams and hopes. We also have the possibility of strengthening our previous relationships between the political, social organisations and unions in your country and ours. And it was also from our participation in the conference that we saw the birth of the solidarity organisations with our country called Peace and Justice for Colombia and the International Network in Solidarity with Colombian Political Prisoners. Furthermore, you are arranging new and important visits of delegates from various organisations from your country to their counterparts in Colombia. And it is through these conferences delegates from social and political movements of countries that are geographically so distant find common struggles and agendas. Read more...
A Hot time in Bogotá
The half dozen colourful cartoon character rubber stamps covering my forearms were strange enough in themselves, but the fact that prison guards were applying them pushed things into the surreal. I was in Bogota Colombia's "Buen Pastor" women's prison trying to get in to see trade union activist Liliany Obando in the prison's high security "patio 6" for political prisoners. Every stage involved a rubber stamp. Argue with the entrance guard, stamp, pat down search, stamp, drug dog sniffs my crotch, stamp, search my fried chicken gift, stamp, disassemble my shoes, stamp, finger prints and digital photo, stamp, x-ray me, stamp, entry into "patio 6", stamp, stamp, stamp. Finally Liliany is standing at the door of her tiny cell looking bright and cheerful with her arms out for a hug, as if she were welcoming us into her real home across town. Liliany has called this 5 1/2 foot by 8 foot cell, which she shares with two other inmates, her home for the last year while she waits for trial on charges of "rebellion" and "funding terrorism". Such detentions are a standard oppressive tactic in Colombia, used against trade union leaders and political activists. They are usually released after a year or two with no trial, but not in Liliany's case...
UPDATE / LETTERS
Today 8 August, it is exactly one year since the Colombian police detained our comrade and friend Liliany Obando and charged her with two counts of rebellion and managing funds for a terrorist organization.
In the attached open letter, Liliany herself gives a brave account on how the Colombian government uses her case in an effort to silence the political opposition and proponents for social justice.
Nowadays when the Colombian government has accepted to build seven US military bases in the country in a clear servile position, Liliany, as the Colombian political prisoners, workers, peasants, indigenous, the poor and African descendents, with their indomitable spirit, inspire all of us to continue to support them in their struggle against human rights abuses and for a just Colombia.
Peace and Justice for Colombia, PJFC calls on all to demand that the Colombian government listen to its people and respects the human and labour rights and implement a Humanitarian Exchange of prisoners as a first step in the political solution to the deep social and complex armed conflict in the country.
Read letter in English | Leer carta en español
- Write to the Colombian government to demand that the Colombian regime free Liliany Obando and demand a Humanitarian Exchange of political prisoners.
- Organize support for Liliany with resolutions from your student groups, anti-war coalitions, solidarity organisations, religious groups, local unions and international conventions.
Send your messages and letters to:
- The Attorney General’s office. Emails: contacto@fiscalia.gov.
co & denuncias@fiscalia.gov.co - President Álvaro Uribe. Email: auribe@presidencia.gov.
co -
Colombian Embassy in Australia (or your own country), Attention Mr Diego Betancur.
Emails: embassyofcolombia@
Letter from Miguel Ángel Beltrán from Bogotá Prison
Miguel Ángel Beltrán, kidnapped in Mexico and held as a prisoner in the Model Jail in Bogotá [Colombia], writes from prison a letter to his comrades and teacher colleagues in which he presents the state in which he finds himself and the irregularities that gnaw at his trial. Below we present the letter in its entirety. Read More...
News
Interview with a Colombian Political Prisoner
By Garry Leech · July 13, 2009 · Colombia Journal
On August 8, 2008, Colombia’s National Police arrested Liliany Obando and charged her with the crime of rebellion and providing funding to a terrorist group. Ten months later, Obando had yet to have her day in court and remained a prisoner in Bogotá’s Buen Pastor Prison. Her work for the international relations commission of FENSUAGRO (The National Federation of Agricultural Farming Unions) included speaking and fundraising trips to Canada, Europe and Australia during which she openly and repeatedly criticized the Colombian government’s human rights record. Obando was the first person arrested as part of the so-called FARC-politica scandal that resulted from alleged evidence found on the laptop computer of FARC Commander Raúl Reyes, who was killed by the Colombian military in March 2008. I recently interviewed Obando in her prison cell. Read more CANADA...
Urgent call for action
FREE LILIANY OBANDO, HUMAN AND LABOR RIGHTS
ACTIVIST, INDEPENDENT FILMMAKER AND SOCIOLOGIST, INJUSTLY IMPRISONED BY THE COLOMBIAN GOVERNMENT FOR THE CHARGE OF “REBELLION”!
LILIANY OBANDO’S TRIAL TO BEGIN ON JULY 7TH: PLEASE ASK YOUR ORGANIZATION TO ENDORSE THIS RESOLUTION CALLING FOR HER FREEDOM!
Liliany Obando’s trial begins on July 7th, 2009. It is urgently important that we build international support for her freedom. We need to get as many organizational endorsements as we can on this brave woman’s behalf. Read more...
Letter from political prisoners
Visit to a Colombian political prisoner
By Vinnie Molina
Liliany is a sociologist, human rights campaigner, a film maker and a trade union activist and consultant working for FENSUAGRO, the National Rural Workers Federation. In recent years she has spent time working on academic research. Her work has taken her to Canada, the US and Australia in an effort to raise awareness of the situation faced by the Colombian trade union movement. This work angered the Colombian regime, which is trying to present the international community with a false picture of what is occurring in Colombia and to cover up the abuses.
Liliany has been held at El Buen Pastor since being detained on the 8th August 2008. Twenty soldiers stormed the home she shared with her two children, now five and fourteen. Since her mother’s arrest this five year old girl has lost her ability to cry. Repeatedly Liliany’s constitutional right to home detention for heads of family has been denied. Her elderly mother must now take care of the two children who went through a terrifying situation seeing their mother taken in such a violent manner, done in complete contempt of the trauma to two innocent children. Read more...
Colombia's Fascist Attack on Academic Freedom
By James J. Brittain
Monday 1 June 2009
It has been well publicized that on March 1, 2008 the Colombian government, with support from Washington, carried out a series of attacks on Ecuadorian soil which violated the sovereignty of a foreign nation (and international law) and resulted in the murder of Raúl Reyes and two dozen other members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army (FARC-EP). Less attention, however, has been given to the five Mexican academics present in the FARC-EP encampment at the time of the attack conducting research on the insurgency movement. Of the five only Lucía Andrea Morett Alvarez survived while Soren Ulises Aviles Angeles [29], Fernando Franco Delgado [28], Veronica Velazquez Ramirez [30], and Juan Gonzalez del Castillo [29] were violently killed. Read more...
FROM COLOMBIA PRISONS
Poemas de los presos políticos
Cuántos días más
Reflections about Colombia´s policy concerning criminals and the treatment of women prisoners
a glimpse from a woman on the inside...
Although we women have struggled throughout history to reach better living conditions, dignified work, acknowledgement, and social and political inclusion, still we must suffer vestiges of a patriarchal and sexist society that does not recognize our role in society. It is a reality that things are getting worse for us women who find ourselves deprived of our liberty. Read More Letters from Liliany...
Stop the harassment of Liliany Obando!
24th April 2009.
Peace and Justice for Colombia, PJFC protests in the strongest possible terms the harassment and psychological pressure being inflicted upon political prisoner Liliany Obando currently held in the “El Buen Pastor” Women’s Prison in Bogota, Colombia.
We are disturbed by reports that the trade union official and human rights activist is being forced out of her quarters and obliged to sleep on the ground as part of a campaign to move her out of the section of the prison in which she is being held at present.
