Two indigenous leaders were killed in separate attacks on Friday 7 December. They are among the latest victims in an ongoing wave of violence that has seen several indigenous leaders and other social activists targeted.
Edwin Dagua Ipia, a 28-year-old Nasca community leader, was shot dead in Caloto, department of Cauca. ‘He was a very prominent leader for defending the communities, for demanding respect from the armed actors towards the territory’, said a local council member.
Another leader, Luis Neider Prado Medina, 23, was killed just a few hours later, also in Caloto. The north Cauca region is one of the most violent in Colombia for social activists
The following morning, indigenous Awa governor Lidia Gomez survived an attack.
According to Colombia’s Ombudsman, 311 social activists and human rights defenders were murdered between 1 January 2016 and 30 June 2018. Colombian human rights organisations the Patriotic March and the Cumbre Agraria recently published new findings that just this year 226 people have been murdered, up to 17 November.