by James Patrick Jordan Death squads don’t take breaks for holidays or holy days. Anyone who has followed the ups and downs of Colombia’s war and peace, repression and struggle, will know that right around the week before and after Christmas and the New Year, and, again, Easter and Holy week, there often occurs a…
By James Patrick Jordan (National Co-Coordinator) Talking about disability Language matters, and in the case of people with disabilities, it matters a lot. Ableism, exclusion, and misconceptions are held up by a foundation of words that are still abundant in U.S. society. Ireland’s National Disability Authority and Brown University both provide clear and succinct guides…
by James Patrick Jordan Originally published in Catalán by the magazine Revistat, and in English, by CovertAction Quarterly The word “security” conjures a couple of distinctly different and conflicting images. One is of human beings living in safe, viable, and sustainable communities, where individuals can freely develop their full potential, not hindered by threat and…
We are very worried for the safety and security of Centro Pazífico coordinator, Darnelly Rodriguez. On November 19 2021, she received the second of two death threats in two weeks. This threat came from the AGC paramilitary group. She was listed along with several other social movement and union leaders in a pamphlet that was…
by James Patrick Jordan originally published in the Orinoco Tribune The Solidarity Center’s activities in Venezuela and Colombia skyrocketed last year. Funding from the mis-named National Endowment for Democracy (NED) soared to almost 60% over the previous year’s awards. The 2020 funding, alone, represents over 40% of the total for similar grants for the last…
by James Patrick Jordan It is just over a month since Colombia’s National Strike (Paro Nacional) began. The international community is appalled by the endless reports of atrocities and abuses by the ESMAD riot police and Colombian Armed Forces (which combine the military and police under one command), and the right-wing gangs allied with them.…
by James Patrick Jordan “James, we are here. There are many wounded, many captured, many bullets, just everything. This is horrible.” The message is from Darnelly Rodriguez, her voice shaking with emotion. Darne is a spokesperson for the Francisco Isaias Cifuentes Human Rights Network (REDDHFIC), and acting coordinator for the Centro Pazífico (Human Rights Center…
by James Patrick Jordan (originally published in LookLeft) Colombia and numbers have their own special relationship. On one of my first visits there, I consulted a map and estimated the place I wanted to go was only around 300 kilometers away. I did not consider the two Andean corridors we would cross, nor the big…
By Eunice Escobar and James Patrick Jordan Colombia’s national Human Rights Day began with the brutal pre-sunrise killing of Javier Ordoñez, a 46-year-old lawyer and taxi driver. In the early morning hours of September 9, 2020, bystanders recorded police who beat and repeatedly tasered Ordoñez. He was arrested while going to the store with friends.…
By Natalia Schuurman, Eduardo Garcia, Victoria Cervantes, and James Patrick Jordan The Alliance for Global Justice has just updated its list of U.S. political prisoners.* Let’s review a few basic facts and statistics, and consider some of the implications. The number of political prisoners in the United States has risen by 12.28% since the beginning…
