THURSDAY 17th NOVEMBER 2005

Sister Clara told me that in San Josesito, no two days are alike and I saw for myself, on this Thursday that I shall never forget, that it is true.

We began classes at 8 on the dot and as on the previous day, the attendance of the children was very good: on Wednesday 30 children had come, on Thursday I was happy to see nearly 50.

At about 11.15 we heard and then saw a helicopter pass by and wondered where it was going. Later we heard machine-gun fire.

That day we played a game of football after classes, girls against boys, and we also played at ‘dreaming’, that is, thinking about what we would like to do that we couldn’t do.

Around 1 p.m. I went to lunch with Sister Clara. A team from Doctors Without Frontiers were still giving consultations as they had done the day before, so we dined with the kitchen of the guesthouse full of people, but it was pleasant.

We talked about the helicopter, the machine-gunfire, about where it might be happening, what might be going on, and after a while G. arrived. He had just received a call from Arenas Altas, there was fighting in the settlement of the ‘Humanitarian Zone’ and there was someone wounded. It was nearly 2.0 p.m.

We waited for a further call, but none came, so G. took a decision: to get together a group of men to go and look for the injured man, going as far as his farm, a little farther on from Arenas Altas.

The group formed rapidly, and they asked me to accompany them as the Peace Brigades weren’t in the community at that time, nor was the Fellowship of Reconciliation. In the morning, the United Nations Commission for Refugees had been there to present their new leader, a woman from Madridcalled Nuria, but they had already gone. I didn’t have to think about it much, I decided to accompany them. The Community Legal Defender (Defensor Comunitario, a state official) was phoned, and we began the walk to Arenas Altas at 2 p.m. at a brisk pace. G. went in front, we were about 10 people. I began in great spirits, but as we carried on walking, I got more and more tired, we were moving so fast and had left in such a hurry we didn’t even think of bringing a bottle of water, and the sun was very strong…

Whilst we walked, spirits were high, the men knew we had to pick up a wounded man, and we went up towards Arenas Altas conscious of the fact that we might run into battles, and this caused some anxiety, but at least we had a clear mission.

On the way, after an hour travelling across the plains, and after climbing a difficult slope, we met the people of Arenas Altas running away from their village, a woman was in tears, she was carrying a baby and told us she had had to leave 4 children behind, and could we please get them out. And that was when I realized what had really gone on.

After a short time, we met a group that was coming from La Union, another village of the Peace Community. We stopped to talk about whether we should continue or not and we could already see soldiers on the ridge in front of us, near the sign that announces that Arenas Altas is part of the Peace Community of San Jose de Apartado.

G. was still enthusiastic and said, yes, we should continue; but the people from La Union seemed more doubtful. However, the men from San Josesito continued ahead. I went with them.

We arrived at a little house belonging to Mr. Alberto Rodríguez, almost at the same time as the soldiers. It was 4.0 p.m. and they, about five men, came up towards us shooting at the ground, insulting us, demanding that we sit down and that the men throw down their machetes.

We were very shocked. On hearing the first shot, I was so frightened my knees gave way beneath me and I looked at G., and seeing that he did not sit down, I didn’t either. He began to say that we were civilians come for a wounded man, but the soldiers weren’t interested in reasons, they kept pointing their weapons at us and saying that the guerrillas who had been firing at them all morning were also dressed in civilian clothes, and what wounded man, there was no wounded man.

We carried on saying who we were and why we were going to Arenas Altas, but they hardly listened. They looked very tired and scared as well. The helicopter was circling above our heads and I began to fear that any moment they would start shooting at us.

Then G. told one of the soldiers that I was a Spanish woman and that I was accompanying them, and tempers calmed down and they whispered amongst themselves. I then dared to speak and I asked the name of one of them, but he didn’t want to tell me. Another of them told me his name as he said he had nothing to hide, and said that they were only asking us to be calm and to wait for their commander to arrive with the rest of the troop, who were carrying a dead guerrilla. And they also advised us to wait until the Community Legal Defender arrived, but no, we decided to carry on as far as the stream, where we then met the rest of the soldiers and their commander, who, completely put out of joint, told us to go back up to the house and go into it. There was no way to dialogue with him, he seemed very agitated. So we did what he said whilst several soldiers pointed their weapons at us and the helicopter carried on protecting them.

Then they all passed by, including a mule with a small bundle in which the dead guerrilla soldier was wrapped.

We went into the balcony of the house, hardly daring to speak. 15 minutes passed by and on seeing that there were no more soldiers nor sign of armed men, we carried on towards Arenas Altas at 5.15 p.m., knowing that night would fall with us still on the road.

In the mud we saw traces of blood and many bullet casings, all from the Army. Definitely amongst the troops there were soldiers from the three battalions of the XVII Brigade, Voltigeros, Velez y Bejaranos, they were heavily armed, with two or three guns each, and amongst them were ‘reinserted guerrillas’ that the men of San Josesito recognized. (It is illegal inColombia to re-involve ex-fighters in the war.)

We arrived at the village, everyone was outside, alarmed. They had been shot at and there was a wounded man, Luis Hernando, who had a bullet in his shoulder. They had shot at the school with the excuse that from there they were being shot at, but in the school there was only one teacher and 6 children, and the teacher just kept repeating that his only weapons were sticks of chalk.

There they told us that the peasant we thought was wounded was already dead, he had been hit with a grenade when he was working in his maize patch.
G. went with me to a cliff where we could call by cellular phone to La Union. They told him that more people were on the way and that he should go and see the body.

When we went down from the cliff, the Legal Defender, Ruben, had arrived and he recommended not to lift the body, that we should wait till the lawyers arrived the next day.

G. said the Community would take responsibility and the Legal Defender said, OK, he would accompany us, but that he took no responsibility for the decision.

We went off again, with the night already closed in and practically without torches, along muddy paths, and when we arrived at a house, after about half an hour’s walk, near to the maize crop where the dead man, Arlen Salas, lay, I could go no further and decided to stay there and wait for them to return.

In the house was the widow of Arlen Salas, a very young woman.

They returned in more or less an hour and a half, carrying Arlen in the hammock which G. had taken with him on the whole journey, and Arlen’s widow started to cry inconsolably, but we didn’t stay long there, we returned to the hamlet of Arenas Altas and the group from La Union had arrived, including W, and very quickly, at nearly 9.0 o’clock at night, we began the descent. The hammock was carried by two men who took turns with another two. The wounded man travelled on a mule, and the Legal Defender, Sister Clara and myself did as well.

The return journey was very sad. Practically no-one spoke. There were a lot of us, more than 50 people and we arrived at midnight at San Josesito, and the whole village, including the children, were up waiting for us. The legal defender took the dead man in his car to Apartado. The wounded man and Amy from the Fellowship of Reconciliation went with them.

The day, the afternoon and the night had been long, but that wasn’t the end of it, as we stayed up talking until the early hours of the morning.

G. stayed in the guesthouse with the Sister and me, saying he didn’t want to go home, that he had started to be frightened, which I understood.

I went over mentally the events of the day, letting into me what had happened, the magnitude of what had gone on. I remembered the woman with the baby saying her children had been left behind and I felt sorrow and rage and impotence. I remembered the teacher who had suffered fear for his pupils and for himself, and I remembered my own fear on seeing the soldiers. I also remember their tired, anxious faces and the sight of the dead man, with his face burnt and many wounds.

But in spite of all this, I managed to sleep a few hours, but one could feel the wakefulness of the village.

On Friday we went to Apartado to see the wounded man and there we met people from the Peace Brigades. And there were soldiers who were asking too much about the wounded man (note: It has happened many times that the army kill any survivors who witness their killings)

In the afternoon a Wake was organized for Arlen, and also for a little girl who had also died the night before. Her family who lived in Medellin were called, and we carried on going over all that had happened.

I recounted it over and over again, people asked me questions and suddenly tiredness hit me like a blow.

The situation in San Josesito is very tense. Today, Wednesday 23rd November, I talked to Sister Clara. The people in Arenas Altas have decided to leave, the fighting has not stopped and the Attorney General’s reps. have announced their arrival in La Holandita (San Josesito) tomorrow. The struggle and the resistance of the people of San Jose continues.

There is an anecdote that Carla Mariano of the Italian Solidarity Network tells, that in a visit of Luis Eduardo (massacred along with his son, his girlfriend and 5 other people by the army in February 2005) to Italy to participate in the March for Peace, he had sat down to rest and Carla half jokingly said to him, ‘A tired campesino, eh?’ and Luis Eduardo had answered: tired yes, but not defeated.

Y.

more on the assassination of Arlen Salas:  http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2005/11/328319.html