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Meeting with the Bureau National de la Defensoría del Pueblo

By Luis-Miguel Gutiérrez and Claudia Pineda

19 February 2020 – 10:30 am
National Ombudsman’s Office (Bureau National de la Defensoría del Pueblo), Bogota, Colombia


Víctor Tafur, Emilie Gaillard, Sandra Rodríguez, Luis Miguel Gutiérrez, Claudia Pineda, Álvaro Amaya, y Alfredo Vargas.

Meeting between the research team of the Chair and members of the Ombudsman’s Office:

  • Sandra Lucía Rodríguez, Delegate for Collective Rights and the Environment, Ombudsman’s Office.
  • Álvaro Amaya, National Director of Promotion and Dissemination, Ombudsman’s Office.
  • Alfredo Vargas, Delegate for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Ombudsman’s Office.

Meeting with members of the National Headquarters of the Ombudsman’s Office (Bureau National de la Defensoría del Pueblo), to discuss the issues of “Peace, Transitional Justice and the Environment” in Colombia.  

This meeting led to a proposal for a scientific collaboration between the Normandy Chair for Peace and the Ombudsman’s Office in the areas of “Collective Rights and the Environment” and “Promotion and Dissemination”. The chair’s involvement will focus around Education for the Rights of Future Generations, Indigenous Peoples and Future Generations, Transitional Justice and Environmental Affairs, as well as other issues.

The Ombudsman’s Office plays a leading role with environmental issues in Colombia. As protector and promotor of human rights, they provide direct support to the populations and ecosystems that surround their 38 offices.

In addition, the Constitutional Court of Colombia has systematically involved the Ombudsman’s Office, in its capacity as a control entity, in monitoring the execution of decisions related to environmental protection.

For example, the Ombudsman’s Office has been involved for more than 3 years in the well-known Atrato River case. In ruling T-622 of 2016, the Constitutional Court recognised the Atrato River basin and its tributaries as an entity subject to rights. Various measures of protection, conservation, maintenance and restoration were ordered to be undertaken by certain State entities and ethnic communities.

The Ombudsman’s Office also participates in other important cases of protection of páramo ecosystems, in Santurbán, Almorzadero and Pisba. The main environmental challenges include the recovery of soil and forests, ensuring food security for the population and protecting against the harmful effects of pollution.

In practice, the work carried out seeks to give populations the tools that will enable them to manage the territory both collectively and ecologically. One example is the development of “a set of educational games focused on the protection of rights and the recovery of historical memory within the framework of the peace process in Colombia”.

As a human rights watchdog, the work of the Office of the Ombudsman is ongoing. Given that it shares a key objective with the Chair, that of promoting the rights of present and future generations, there are great hopes for future collaboration.


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Chaire Normandie pour la Paix (April 10, 2020). Meeting with the Bureau National de la Defensoría del Pueblo. Normandy Chair for Peace. Retrieved April 22, 2025 from https://doi.org/10.58079/mmym


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