Indigenous March in
Colombia Announced in
France
Paris - The
National Indigenous
Organization of Colombia
(ONIC) condemned human
rights violations in
that South American
country and announced a
march from Cali to
Bogota, it was reported
here.
During a colloquium at
La Maison de l'Amerique
Latine in Paris, ONIC
Secretary General Luis
Fernando Arias noted
that Colombian
indigenous people not
only demand the land,
but also peace and
access to development.
"President (Alvaro)
Uribe governs for the
financial oligarchies
and turns his back on
farmers, workers and
indigenous people. We
also demand the
redistribution of our
country's huge wealth,"
he stressed.
Arias and the president
of Colombia's Democratic
Alternative Pole (PDA),
Carlos Gaviria, pointed
out that their country
is going through a deep
social and political
crisis, which has been
aggravated by escalating
violence.
"We do everything
peacefully, but the
regimen of democratic
security under which
1,244 indigenous people
have been murdered by
paramilitary groups, and
the government's
extrajudicial
executions, are
intolerable," he noted.
The ONIC leader added
that in order to justify
their actions, the Uribe
administration has
falsely accused the
indigenous people of
alleged links with the
guerrillas.
We are peaceful, that is
our philosophy, but it
seems incredible to us
that the European Union
(EU) is still
negotiating a trade
agreement with Colombia,
while ignoring human
rights violations, Arias
noted. |
