Despite the adverse conditions and dangers that they expose themselves to, thousands of women work every day for peace and against war and violence. These groups of women carry out their work all over the world, but especially from places in conflict such as Ukraine, Russia, Byelorussia, Afghanistan, Palestine, Israel, Iraq, Iran or Colombia.
The Ruta Pacifica of Colombian women emerges as a political proposal of national character in 1996 in response to the situation of grave violence in which the women in conflict zones find themselves, a conflict that they had been suffering for almost three decades. This armed struggle, never openly recognized as war, has lasted about six decades and has resulted in some nine million victims.
The Ruta Pacifica de las Mujeres, as a part of the International Network of Women in Black is a social movement that from its origins has sought a negotiated settlement for the armed conflict in Colombia in the conviction that negotiation and peace, along with equality and social justice, are the only path to a solution in Colombia.
At present, Ruta consists of more than 315 organizations in 9 regions of the country bringing about a gathering of women from diverse social sectors such as country women, indigenous, Afro-descendants, young people, professionals, intellectuals, students, and others…, all defining themselves as feminists at both the national and the territorial level, inasmuch as the groups come from the territories. They are anti-militarists, as they do not support either insurgents or militarists or militarism, and pacifists, as their perspective is for a guarantee of human rights.
Ruta Pacifica has carried out its own ‘Peace Process’ in which there has been accompaniment provided to more than 400 women, with Ruta working towards the goal that these women express themselves not only as victims of war but also as social and political actors in the process of negotiation and building of peace.
Women in Black against war SUPPORT the considerations of Ruta Pacifica:
♀ They consider that the war is not over in Colombia, as there are persistent features of the armed conflict such as narco-trafficking which finances the war, and other groups including these that determine certain policies at a territorial level. Although they are optimistic with regard to the government of Gustavo Petro, who has up to now done important things for the people in general, and although he is a resilient man, he has yet to define what he is going to do with regard to women.
♀ Ruta continues its social mobilization as a form of expressing their disagreement with the war; likewise, to demonstrate that peace is not only the negotiation of the armed conflict, rather it is also the moral, ethical and cultural reconstruction of every village, city or region.
♀ It is considered that La Ruta has been one of the most important civil initiatives confronting the war in Colombia, one of their slogans being to deactivate all the artefacts of war, those of iron, those of words that incite war and those of forgetting.
Translation: Trisha Novak, USA – Yolanda Rouiller, WiB Spain