War in Colombia

Colombia suffers from a decades old civil war that has become increasingly violent. Human rights violations are rife and civil society is under constant attack. US military aid only increases the levels of violence and reduces the possibility of finding solutions to Colombia’s economic and social problems.

Using the “war on drugs” and the “war on terror” as twin justifications, the US provides billions of dollars of funding and equipment to Colombia’s military. Colombia’s military has the worst human rights record in the hemisphere and is linked to paramilitary organizations operating terrorist death squads. Since 1999, US aid to Colombia has averaged over half a billion dollars annually, with more than eighty percent of that going to support military and police programs.

Herbicide Spraying in Colombia

A core piece of this US aid program is a militarized drug crop eradication program. Over the course of the past decade, the US government has actively sponsored and promoted aerial spraying of herbicides over large areas of Colombian countryside. Ostensibly, the spray programs are intended to kill drug crops: coca, which is the raw material for cocaine, and opium poppy, the raw material for heroin. However, the spray campaigns create widespread damage, killing food crops and destroying delicate rainforest ecosystems. The spray sometimes lands on people’s homes and schools, or even lands directly on people’s skin. Concerns exist about the effects of the spray campaigns on agriculture, biodiversity, and people’s health.

Las Lianas works with partner organizations to support Colombian colleagues as they fight to stop the spraying, and to educate US policy-makers and the public about the devastating effects of this US-sponsored policy.

Las Lianas Activities

The Las Lianas Colombia Project works to collect and publicize information about the impacts of the aerial herbicide spraying, and to help provide scientific documentation of health and environmental effects experienced by the targeted communities. We also work to collect and disseminate information on other threats to human rights in Colombia.

Colombia Project Coordinator, Rachel Massey’s, work has been at the forefront of publicizing the negative effects of the drug erradication program. In 2003, one of her articles on the topic was selected for a Project Censored award as a top story of the year.

Las Lianas has also produced a series of overviews on the impacts of the spray campaigns, and provided these to partner groups working to promote human rights in Colombia. Our most detailed report, "Health and Environmental Effects of Herbicide Spray Campaigns in Colombia," (March 2002) summarizes existing information on the health and environmental effects of the spray campaigns available from press reports and unpublished documents. Our work is useful to our partners because we presented information from a wide range of media and scientific sources. Previously, this material had not been available in a summarized, readily accessible form.

We have also provided expert commentary on US government documents relevant to the spray campaigns.

·        In 2002, Las Lianas prepared a response to a State Department sponsored health report that purports to show the spray campaigns have created no adverse health effects in Colombia. Designed for use by partner organizations in lobbying efforts, the response outlines the principal scientific flaws in the report, including small sample size, lack of explicit or reproducible methodology, and lack of consistency between data presented and conclusions drawn.

·        Also in 2002, Las Lianas assisted the Amazon Alliance in writing a detailed letter to the US Environmental Protection Agency urging EPA to request detailed information on the spray campaigns from the US State Department. The letter posed questions on issues including the chemicals used in the spray campaigns, the quantities applied per acre, and the availability of health data on the formulations used, and was a principal resource guiding EPA as it evaluated State Department claims about the safety of the spray campaigns.

·        Las Lianas was one of several organizations submitting expert commentary to the US Senate, responding to an EPA report on State Department activities in Colombia.

·        Las Lianas submitted letters, and helped other experts to develop letters, supporting the application of the precautionary principle by a Colombian court.

In addition to producing written materials, we have worked to create networks of science and health professionals concerned about the situation in Colombia. We worked to bring a scientific voice into the debate, for example by helping to create an open letter to the US Senate from scientists concerned about the health and environmental effects of the spray campaigns. More than 150 scientists and health professionals across the US signed the letter.

We also work locally in western Massachusetts, in collaboration with the peace and solidarity organization Solidaridad Colombia and others, to host Colombian speakers and events to educate the public about the situation in Colombia.