COLOMBIA: Christian Peacemaker Teams urgently seeking participants for delegations to Colombia, 19 May- 2 June and 14-27 July 2011.  Apply IMMEDIATELY to join May group.  

The delegation scheduled for 19 May-2 June will focus on the communities of Garzal and Nueva Esparanza.  For decades, farmers have cultivated lands in these communities in southern Bolívar province.  According to Colombian law, they have a right to the land after ten years.  Instead, Colombian authorities granted title for these lands to a drug lord, now deceased, who operated a cocaine-processing laboratory until his operation was closed down in the 1980s.  Now his heirs are trying to sell the property to agro-businesses that want the land to mono-crop palm oil.  Despite death threats, the community is remaining on the land.  Currently embroiled in a legal process to have their right of possession recognized and titles granted to community members, they have asked Christian Peacemaker Teams to accompany them in this struggle

In early March 2011 representatives from around the globe, including Colombia team member Eloy Garcia, gathered in New Delhi, India for three days.  The event, convened by Ekta Parishad, was a planning session for forming a global alliance called "South-South Solidarity— Global Action 2012."  

Ekta Parishad (“Unity Forum” in Hindi), is a federation of 11,000 organizations and counts more than one million supporters in at least fifteen Indian states.  Ekta Parishad espouses the Gandhian principles of nonviolence and works at the grassroots level so that all Indians can live in dignity with access to land, forest, and water.