Colombia’s national indigenous organization ONIC sent an open letter to the FARC requesting talks about the indigenous’ request to respect their territories and peoples.
In the letter, the ONIC asks to “create space for dialogue with the armed factions involved in the internal conflict.”
The indigenous denounce its peoples are increasingly subjected to “genocidal extermination processes marked by massacres, assassinations, kidnapping, forced displacement and the systematic violation of human and collective rights of our people.”
The ONIC asks for an open and public dialogue and known to the authorities, civil society and human rights organizations.
To decrease the impact of the conflict on indigenous peoples, the ONIC asks the FARC to no longer commit criminal acts against indigenous and to stop the (forced) recruitment of indigenous to fight for the rebels.
Because of their relative autonomy and the fact that the conflict has moved to the more remote indigenous areas, Colombian indigenous tribes have long been vulnerable to massacres, displacement and intimidation by all parties involved in the 45-year conflict.