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An incredibly diverse country both culturally and geographically, Colombia has suffered under the burden of armed conflict since the 1960s. Colombia is second only to Sudan in number of persons displaced by conflict. Approximately 3 million persons have been forced from their homes since 1985 and about 200,000 are displaced every year. An overwhelming majority of them are Afro-Colombian.
IRD, through two programs funded by the U.S. State Department, is easing the suffering of families affected by the conflict. In the first program, IRD will improve the access to government services, particularly health services, for displaced families by building the organizational capacity of local associations for displaced persons. These associations are best placed to reach out directly to families in need and help them receive the benefits they are entitled to. In the meantime, IRD will provide immediate humanitarian assistance, including food and basic household goods.
In the second program, IRD is assisting the families of persons that are killed or missing as a result of the civil conflict, specifically in the historically marginalized, conflict-affected Afro-Colombian communities on Colombia’s Pacific coast, near the border with Ecuador. During the three-year program, IRD will mitigate the grief and psychological trauma among surviving family members, improve access to legally entitled reparations and government social assistance programs, strengthen community-level democratic structures, and promote reconciliation at the community level. As in the first program, this program will assist victims’ families while simultaneously developing the capacity of affected communities to do so on an ongoing basis through the formation and training of indigenous victims associations, giving particular attention to strengthening the role and capacities of the local elected Community Councils responsible for management of communal Afro-Colombian lands and the Table of Displaced People (Mesa de Desplazados), which coordinates the activities of internally displaced persons associations in the area.