Indigenous Peoples at North Colombia as active, outstanding, peacebuilders

Colombia is a pluricultural and multilingual state. Today, 115 Indigenous peoples and 65 languages are officially recognised. Despite these important numbers, since 2009, the Constitutional Court established that 34 Indigenous peoples were in cultural and/or physical risk of extinction due of the internal armed conflict in their territories.

In 2016, the Colombian government signed the Peace Agreement with the FARC guerrillas that meant the ending of the longest internal war in Latin America. The Commission of Truth created after the Peace Agreement released its final report in 2022, which remarked how the internal conflict continued practices associated with the colonial period and structural racism, leading to a differentiated impact of the internal war with a greater number of victims belonging to ethnic groups. This fact is known by the Indigenous peoples as the continuation of the ‘Long War’, which started since foreigners arrived in their land, utterly transforming their existence and challenging their worldviews.

During the internal war, Indigenous groups at North Colombia were in the middle of confrontations among guerrillas, paramilitary and official armed groups, violating their territories and cultures, alongside the traditional and political leaderships advocating protection. Indigenous groups’ strategies for defending their territories, cultures and natures, and initiatives for ‘peace’ building, have not been properly approached nor understood.

The aim of this project is to approach spiritual and political leaders and analyse the Commission of Truth report to understand the strategies used by Indigenous peoples during that internal conflict, focusing on Iku, Wiwa, Kogui, Kanwamo, Etté-Enaka and Yukpa peoples of North Colombia. This will allow better understanding of how Indigenous knowledges have had an important role in the physical and cultural survival of these societies. Documenting these strategies will enhance intercultural pan-ethnic dialogue and make local realities more visible.