Colombia: The Atrato River Legal Decision

5.18. En consecuencia, las políticas públicas sobre la conservación de la biodiversidad deben adecuarse y centrarse en la preservación de la vida, de sus diversa manifestaciones, pero principalmente en la preservación de las condiciones para que esa biodiversidad continúe desplegando su potencial evolutivo de manera estable e indefinida, tal y como lo ha señalado la Corte en abundante jurisprudencia108. De igual forma, las obligaciones del Estado sobre protección y conservación de los modos de vida de los pueblos indígenas, las comunidades negras y campesinas implican garantizar las condiciones para que estas formas de ser, percibir y aprehender el mundo puedan pervivir. 

 

The Atrato River runs through Colombia's northwestern Pacific rainforest. For years, the region has suffered from the ravages of illegal gold mining, which has led to both humanitarian and environmental crises.

In early 2015, the Colombian group Tierra Digna began a litigation process to defend the Atrato River and the rights of the communities inhabiting its basin. The lawsuit was brought in collaboration with the Foro Interétnico Solidaridad Chocó and different Afro-Colombian Community Councils located in the river basin.

The decision aims to offer protection to the Atrato River and guarantee the fundamental rights of the communities that inhabit its banks from a new perspective called “biocultural rights.” Under this new paradigm, the court has reasoned that the most effective way to protect ethnic communities' rights is through biodiversity conservation and ecosystem restoration on the Atrato River.

Awarding rights and achieving them, however, are not the same thing. To achieve protection, conservation, maintenance and restoration, action is needed.

Read the Atrato River decision. (Spanish)

Photo: The Atrato River at sunset. Photo courtesy of Jose Montoya via Wikimedia Commons.