Death threats, bodyguards and a FARC commander named Schlumpf: Dangerous life with Colombia's conservationists | Cop16

Politicians, conservationists and business people from around the world met last week at the Cop16 biodiversity conference in Cali, Colombia, to discuss how to save nature.

However, for those working on the ground, fighting for the environment is the most dangerous country in the world. A third of the 196 environmentalists killed last year were Colombians. Here, four conservationists give us an insight into their working lives and the dangers they face.

“I'm just a little woman trying to save monkeys”: Ángela Maldonado

When I was 28 years old, I was controlled by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). area in Vista Hermosa to search for an endemic Colombian woolly monkey species. Many people said I was completely crazy, but I had to deal with the FARC to get to the area where the monkeys are.

I went to talk to the FARC commander. His nickname was Smurf because he was very small. He was also very dangerous – five days before I met him people were telling me that he had killed someone. He was nice to me from the start and I always think that even the worst people have a good side.

He told me where to find the monkeys and contacted other FARC commanders so I could enter their cities. I was always alone. I pose no danger to anyone – I am 160 cm tall and weigh 52 kg. To these people, I'm just a little woman trying to save monkeys. That was in 2001 – I worked in the Amazon for more than 20 years fighting the illegal wildlife trade, focusing on monkeys. I managed to enforce hunting bans on woolly monkeys in the southern Amazon region, on the border between Colombia, Peru and Brazil.

I hope that the international community supports a peace agreement with all of our illegal armed groups. Once the rights of local people are respected, we can advance peace with nature.
Ángela Maldonado is the founder of Fundacion Entropika

“I had to bring a body.”Guard and wear a bulletproof jacket”: Fernando Trujillo

When I was five, I went to the Orinoco River with my grandfather and saw river dolphins for the first time. It's amazing to be in a tropical forest with toucans and see dolphins in the water at the same time. For the people of the Amazon, they are like the jaguars in the water – they believe that the dolphins have cities under water and live like humans.

Pollution is one of the biggest threats to river dolphins in the Amazon. Gold miners use mercury to extract the precious metal from river mud and dump it in rivers and lakes. I discovered that my own mercury levels were well above safe limits, probably because I had been eating fish in the Amazon for so many years. It can damage your central nervous system – I'm lucky I wasn't affected by it.

In 2016, my life was threatened because I submitted a mercury analysis in an Amazon fish, which led to the Colombian government banning its sale. When I went to the Amazon, I had to bring a bodyguard with me and wear a bulletproof jacket. It was a very sad moment in my life. I was very worried about my daughters and stopped taking them to the Amazon for several years. In the Amazon region, more than 500,000 people work in organized crime – dealing in gold, cocaine, timber and animal trafficking. The greatest protection against armed groups is to stand with local communities, and that is exactly how we work.

I surveyed more than 84,000 km (52,000 miles) of waterways in seven countries in search of river dolphins. Almost a year ago, we led 11 countries from across Asia and South America to sign a groundbreaking treaty to protect river dolphins. At Cop16 we supported a resolution to protect dolphins in 29 key locations in Asia and South America.
Fernando Trujillo is the founder of Fundacion Omacha

“There are people who have no scruples about ending a life”: Sandra Bessudo

Malpelo is an island 500 km off the Colombian Pacific coast. When I first went there in 1987, I absolutely fell in love with it. Life beneath the sea surface is incredible: the island is surrounded by a spectacle of hammerhead sharks, snappers, barracuda, rays and moray eels. While I was there I saw large tuna boats with their decks full of dead sharks dropping their anchors on the coral – it was devastating to see.

After that, all I wanted to do was go back and do everything in my power to get the government to protect me. I started petitioning the President and thanks to my work, Malpelo has been protected since 1995. There is a “no take” area of ​​47,000 square kilometers around it.

I have experienced difficult moments when I and my team were threatened because of my work. When I started fighting against illegal fishing, I faced several large boats, not only from Colombia but also from other countries. There were no protocols about what to do, so I literally boarded the boats, explained to them what they were doing wrong, and made them swear to God that they would not get back on. I was a young woman at the time and a bit naive, but I always approached her with respect and kindness. We received threats and the Colombian Navy finally told me to be more careful and not be so trusting.

Unfortunately, today there are people who have no qualms about ending another person's life. I hope that no other environmental activist loses his life defending life.
Sandra Bessudo is the founder of Fundacion Malpelo

“Don’t take sides and never discuss politics”: Rosamira Guillen

I'm on a mission to save cotton-top monkeys that weigh just one pound and are about the size of a squirrel. They have a shock of white hair that sticks up like Einstein and small warrior faces – they are very territorial. The first time I saw one I thought: Holy cow, that's a special little monkey.

I was the director of the Barranquilla Zoo when I started working to protect these monkeys, but when I started seeing them in the wild, I realized that that's what fills my soul – being in the forest be. Five decades of civil unrest in our country have driven out farmers who are clearing the forest where these monkeys live to make way for traditional ranching and agriculture. We create protected areas and prevent hunting in the forest. It's slow progress: you can clear a hectare of forest in a day, but it takes at least 20 years to do it.

The areas in which we work were historically “red zones”, meaning they were controlled by illegal armed groups, until the peace agreement was signed in 2016. It is a landscape in which illegally armed groups can hide. We heard many stories from the people who lived there about how terrible it was: in the middle of the night they would turn off the power, come to your house and take random people with them, and you never heard from them again. Sometimes their bodies were found. There was fear and silence in these communities.

Cop16 was important because it provided an opportunity to raise funds for organizations like ours that are small, grassroots-oriented and in desperate need of support to continue their conservation efforts.

We have already protected more than 5,000 hectares of land for the monkeys. Safety remains a concern for us. We try to stay on the political sidelines. We do not take sides in order not to be labeled as sympathizers of one side or the other. We never discuss politics in our conversations so as not to accidentally step on someone else's toes. Just do your work and have fun, that's what I tell my team.
Rosamira Guillen is co-founder of Fundación Proyecto Titi

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