TThe road out of Kalot winds through lush valleys dotted with fields of grazing cows, past patchwork pineapple plantations, small old-growth rainforests and the stunning greenery of coca plantations before climbing into the hills. enter.
This valley in the northern foothills of the Andes may seem calm on an early winter afternoon, but it is in one of Colombia's most dangerous regions, especially for children.
Eight years ago, in 2016, a peace deal officially ended the country's long civil war and won then-president Juan Manuel Santos the Nobel Peace Prize. However, in the Western Cauca region, where the war was particularly intense and peace was long-awaited, peace lasted only six months. The government's promises of alternative employment and land reform were never kept.
Guerrilla factions that left in opposition to the peace deal and demobilized fighters unable to find work have once again taken up arms to fight with criminal gangs for control of the region's lucrative drug trade and illegally mined gold. Ta. At one time there were 16 armed groups in the region, and although they have now consolidated to about a quarter of that number, indigenous activists say violence is resurging, mutating and taking on new ferocity. speak
This group is always in need of new infantry. They look to the communities they fight to fill it. Over the past four years, more than 850 children have been taken from here to fight. Hundreds of people are still missing.
“The hardest and most difficult thing is what is happening to our children,” said Kiwe Tegnas Indigenous Guards, a non-military group that has been protecting indigenous communities and leaders in Cauca for 20 years. Leader Avey Noskiu Silva said.
“We see that once they reach the age of 13 or 14, the insurgents begin to tempt them with things that we cannot offer them,” said one of the region's best-organized and most numerous indigenous groups. says Silva, a NASA member.
While some children are forced to fight, many others are lured with promises of easy jobs, goods such as new mobile phones or clothes, or even plastic surgery or dental treatment. In a region that has historically been marginalized and has few economic opportunities for young people, such offers may be difficult to resist.
Caloto has one of the highest rates of child adoption in Colombia, said Vanessa Noskiu, project coordinator for the region for one of three charities supported by the War Children's Fund. guardian and observer This year, we will promote Christmas along with “Médecins Sans Frontières'' and “Parallel History.'' The appeal has so far raised more than £1 million.
The escalation in violence in recent years has resulted in a stark parity. “Boys and men used to be more likely to be assassinated or drafted into the military. Now they are targeting women as well,” Noskew said.
Some women are subject to sexual abuse and exploitation. While previously working as a counselor for girls, Noskiu said the girls were forced to take cocaine to develop an addiction and were forced to accept one of the fighters as a “sexual partner”. I heard this from some people.
Many, like the boys, head straight to the front lines. “The most frightening thing is that despite their inexperience, the insurgents pushed them first to fight on the front lines,” said Yonier Esteban Pacho Acaro, a youth leader at NASA. “We have 16- and 17-year-old children who are not with us right now,” added Acaro, who has lost several friends to the violence and worries about the pressure on his 13-year-old brother.
Anii Zapata, from the Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern Cauca (ACIN), said the true scale of the child recruitment problem was realized in 2019 when communities stepped up their surveillance. As the first female director of ACIN's Life Protection Network, Zapata is responsible for security and human rights in 22 indigenous communities across Cauca Island.
As reports of missing children increased, ACIN observers began contacting families and communities to identify and register cases of child recruitment into armed groups. That year, they recorded 10 cases. In 2020, it was 110. By 2021, the number had reached 272.
“When we started investigating the territory, we found a huge number of missing children. We realized that they were being kidnapped,” Zapata said. “There was so much fear. It was so secret that mothers buried their children in the middle of the night.”
In the four years to August 2024, ACIN recorded 851 child recruitments, but ACIN believes this figure only captures a small part of the problem. The majority of these children remain missing, and dozens have been confirmed as casualties of the fighting.
“We rescued about 300 people and we know that about 40 or 50 people died. We don't know how many others are in mass graves,” Zapata said.
Silva, the Kiwe Tegnas coordinator, sees child recruitment and trafficking as part of a broader attack on indigenous communities by armed groups. The past year has seen a spike in assassinations of NASA's spiritual elders. NASA's spiritual elders were highly respected for their role in the community even during the most violent period of the civil war, when other NASA leaders were attacked. “This is irreplaceable. Their numbers are very small and killing them is the very process of eradicating our communities,” he said.
A total of 13 spiritual leaders have been killed in Cauca since 2012, six of whom were assassinated in the last year. They are all people who were chosen for their roles because they were born “with spirit” and spent decades training. These losses risk demoralizing local communities, weakening their social structures and undermining control over traditional lands, making it easier for outsiders from armed groups to move into the area, he said. said.
“Not only do you lose the individual, you lose all of their knowledge, all of their cultural practices,” Silva said. And between recruiting children and targeting the elderly, the group is “targeting the future and past of the community.”
But this corner of Colombia has long been known for its rebelliousness. Indigenous communities have a decades-long tradition of resisting armed outsiders, including guerrillas, national armies, and paramilitary groups.
“Colombians say, 'Cauca resists' and 'Cauca is strong,'” Noskiu said. The War Child Project (Mei Kiwe, or Mother Earth), which she coordinates, is part of this resistance and supports ACIN's efforts in Cauca to reach at-risk youth. I am doing it. Its name reflects the connection that many Colombian indigenous communities see between the exploitation of their land and natural environment and the exploitation of their youth.
Kalot's Youth Hub provides a safe space for activities such as sport, music and art, where young people can talk about the pressures they face. This activity aims to strengthen community bonds and provide an alternative way to earn a living for communities where work is scarce and fighting seems to be the only way to earn a wage. .
“We always say we are not the solution, but we are another option for young people,” said Willington García Canas, 22, a youth leader at the center. . He himself was drawn to the dance program run by the center and participated in it. Children as well as young people can participate because people are still vulnerable in their 20s.
Natalia, who requested anonymity, grew up in Kalot and went to war at the age of 18 in the war, which officially ended four years ago. It was a life of hunger, fear, cold, damp, and the constant threat of death and loss.
She said she joined the program voluntarily, but quit after three years. Now she will never help other young people make their way. “We had nothing to eat, were soaked in the rain and baked by the sun,” she said. “We watched our friends fall. Having a roof over our heads and food allowed us to take care of our parents.”
Even the act of recording child recruitment is dangerous. It risks disrupting the flow of fighters to the country's most ruthless and violent groups. Sandra Patricia Silva, head of ACIN's human rights watchdog, which collects much of the data, has faced death threats and was recently tracked down by armed groups.
“It scares you, we go to all areas without security guards, and sometimes I work alone,” she said.
In March of this year, 65-year-old NASA leader Carmelina Hure Pavi was assassinated near Toribio while trying to stop armed groups from recruiting children. But Kiwe Tegnas, an indigenous guard, has an even more difficult task ahead of him. They try to disrupt groups recruiting children and help young people escape without weapons. All they carry is a symbolic wooden baton decorated with red and green ribbons, the colors of earth and blood. Their uniform is a blue gilet worn over regular clothing. Their weapons are moral authority and community solidarity.
Although their approach sounds far-fetched, the unit has decades of experience dating back to the Civil War. Rescue teams work 24 hours a day and often receive several calls a day.
Silva occasionally visits commanders carrying children and tries to persuade them to leave.
“I try to be open-minded. The children will get bored and try to run away. The mother will miss them,” he said. Sometimes it works.
