Kankuamo Indians Have Paid High Price in Blood
Constanza Vieira - Special to IPS

ATÁNQUEZ, Cesar, Colombia, Aug 9 (IPS) - The killings have decreased but "in Rioseco and Murillo we still have problems caused by the war," says Jaime Arias, the leader of the Kankuamo Indians, referring to two of the 12 villages and towns inhabited by the ethnic group in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountain range in northern Colombia.

Arias explains that because 234 members of the indigenous community have been killed since 1999, all 13,000 members of the group have been granted provisional measures by the Interamerican Court of Human Rights to protect their lives, and the violence has waned. Only six Kankuamo Indians were killed last year and none so far this year.

The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is one of the conflict areas in Colombia where the leftist guerrillas are involved in a turf war with the extreme-right paramilitaries and state security forces.

As in the rest of the country, most of the victims of the armed conflict in the region have been civilians.

There is economic interest in the area. According to an April 2005 petition by the Kankuamo Indigenous Organisation, several projects are planned for the region: a dam and hydroelectric plant on the Guatapurí River, an irrigation system, the diversion of the Ranchería River to facilitate the extraction of coal by multinational corporations, and an ethnotourism plan that would bring in tourists "to different places that we consider to be the pillars of our culture."

The Kankuamo have opposed these projects "that interfere with our territories and affect the economic life and spiritual harmony of the Sierra Nevada," the petition adds.

The waters of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountains -- part of which were declared a biosphere reserve in 2002 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) -- are essential to supplying the city of Valledupar, capital of the province of Cesar.

The small town of Murillo has become virtually a ghost town since it was occupied by the paramilitaries in 2002 and three-quarters of the local residents fled. Some families returned this year, but anyone interested in doing so must first seek permission from the local army commander, and allow any food products they take in with them to be inspected.

In Rioseco, only three houses were still inhabited, out of a total of more than 100. But despite the fear and the threats against community leaders, 32 indigenous families returned in May 2004.

"This was totally deserted," recalls one elderly man, gesturing around him, towards houses that still peer out from behind overgrown weeds and brush.

"The security forces left and the ‘paras' (paramilitaries) showed up," says his daughter. "People were threatened, including the local cabildo (indigenous authority) on the day he was elected."

At an intersection near Rioseco, eight km from Valledupar, more than 50 indigenous people were massacred.

"The paras created a Kankuamo ‘cemetery' here," a local leader tells IPS on a drive along the road. The community plans to set up a monument at the spot to commemorate the dead.

"At first, when people would warn ‘the paras are coming', we would go and hide in the hills. But later, they would cut off our escape routes, and by the time they came into the town, we were already surrounded. Then they would have their fun," recalls Luisa, a local resident of Atánquez, the main town in the Kankuamo reservation.

What Luisa means when she says "they would have their fun" is that the bloodshed would begin. Local residents still remember how in a café in Valledupar, paramilitaries joked around, mimicking the way Héctor Arias, a 28-year-old Kankuamo father of five who they had just killed in the nearby village of La Mina, begged for his life.

"When the paras would come, they would only go down certain streets, where the ‘torcidos' (alleged guerrilla collaborators) supposedly lived. They would show up at 5:30 AM and knock on the doors, and often the people inside weren't even given time to throw on their clothes," says Juan Carlos, another local resident of Atánquez, where the largest number of civilians were killed.

"There were two, three, four killings a week. You got so used to it that you thought something strange was going on when no one was murdered," he adds.

The cobblestone streets of Atánquez and its sleepy tree-lined central plaza give testimony to the civil war: the shop at the northeastern corner of the square is still closed. When a group of paramilitaries could not find the owner, they sacked the store and killed a driver instead.

Several children in Atánquez say they remember when three men were slain in front of more than 500 people in the plaza. What they recall most vividly was how the bodies jerked about when they were hit by the bullets.

Nearby, in Coco plaza, a man taking care of his elderly parents was stabbed to death.

The local butchershop, where the paramilitaries lay in wait for their victims to seize them at 5:00 in the morning, is still closed, and has a cross painted on its doorway.

Especially missed is Abel Alvarado, an apprentice of the local spiritual leader who spearheaded the movement for revival of the Kankuamo culture, which was almost lost, studying botany and traditional medicine from a young age.

He was killed by the paramilitaries on "an unforgettable 8th of December" in 2002, says a woman who prefers not to elaborate on the painful memory.

Meanwhile, the young Yairson Villazón was murdered because he recognised, among a group of paramilitaries posing as soldiers, several of the men who had completed their military service with him.

"He was just a good kid," one of Villazón's cousins tells IPS.

"They're friends of mine, they're from the army, he told his mother when she said he shouldn't go out because the paras had arrived," the cousin explains. Yairson was happy to see his former companions, and showed them photos from their time together in military service. The photos sealed his fate.

At the entrance to Ramalito, another village, more than 20 members of the paramilitary militias were killed by explosives planted by the guerrillas, although the press reported that only seven were killed. "There were members of the military too, they were recognised by the people," an indigenous man who will remain anonymous for safety reasons tells IPS.

According to Basilio Arias, head of the council of elders of the Kankuamo Indigenous Organisation, many older members of the community are dying of heart attacks today, "because of the pain they carry inside them."

"The fear has not gone away," he says.

Will it ever? "Who knows," smiles Luisa, "I sure hope so. And I hope it does sooner rather than later, because we're sick and tired of all the violence." (END/2006)