On February 12, 2016 a group of women in Colombia decided to take the initiative to commit themselves to peace. This implied taking into their hands the tasks of educating, mobilizing and building support for the Peace Accord being negotiated between the Colombian Government and the FARC guerrillas, both inside Colombia and abroad.
Colombian women have carried most of the brunt of the very long and painful war for more than 50 years. They carry the family responsibilities once the men in their lives have been killed or disappeared. Most of the more than 6 million displaced persons in Colombia are women and children.
Colombia Support Network invites US women to join and support this effort, backing this initiative and educating people in the United States about the importance of ending the last remaining armed conflict in the Western Hemisphere today.
If you feel you want to join this effort, please send us your name, city and the name of the organization you belong to, in order to add your name to a statement that will be sent to Bogota to be read on March 8, International Women’s Day.
The proposed statement reads as follows:
“We the undersigned understand that it will require a strong effort to construct a lasting peace in Colombia. This implies not only education, but constant monitoring to see that the goals of the negotiated peace are being met. We, as U.S. women, will do our part by monitoring our government in order to see that it keeps its promise of supporting the peace process and will especially focus on transitional justice, civil society initiatives and support for rural campesino projects, instead of more military aid.”
If you wish to sign this statement please send your name and the city where you live to our email address csn@igc.org under the following title: I support monitoring the Colombian Peace Process.