FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 18, 2018
Currently under construction in northwest Colombia, the Hidroituango dam project is expected to become the nation’s largest hydroelectric plant. Since its approval in 2009, communities have voiced concerns about damming the Cauca River due to the potential for severe environmental degradation resulting from extensive deforestation, habitat loss, and impacts on air, soil, and water quality. The dam’s reservoir would flood 11,120 acres, putting at risk the livelihoods of many of the 180,000 people who live along the river and who depend on it for fishing, artisanal mining, and agriculture. Despite these broad environmental and social risks, neither the company nor the Colombian government informed the impacted communities about the project nor did they carry out adequate consultations regarding the project or any resettlement plans.
Since Movimiento Rios Vivos Antioquia (MRV) began opposing the project, two of its members have been assassinated and 17 have received death threats. They have also denounced cases of torture, trumped-up criminal charges, mass detentions, harassment, public defamation, discrimination, and surveillance. The MRV has also raised concerns over the involvement of the company’s private security in aggressive actions toward communities, as well as over allegations of torture by Colombian armed forces. An estimated 700 families have already been forcibly evicted or displaced to make way for project construction.
Adding to the project’s complications, the region where the project is located was marred by intense violence during the era of armed conflict in Colombia. More than 50 massacres and hundreds of victims of forced disappearance were documented in the 12 municipalities most impacted by the dam. Communities have constantly called for the identification and exhumation of mass graves, where they hope to locate loved ones who disappeared, as well as for preserving historical memory through transitional justice initiatives. Yet the Hidroituango dam could be used to obfuscate the violent history in the region by merely flooding over the graves and displacing families from this region for a second time. For years, communities have been participating fully in legal processes to request the exhumation of bodies, and while some exhumations have been carried out, the majority still remain. Communities have appealed to authorities to halt construction on Hidroituango until authorization to exhume the remaining bodies is received. Communities continue to expose many human rights violations and environmental impacts surrounding the project. It is in this context that Hugo Albeiro George Pérez and Luis Alberto Torres Montoya, members of Movimiento Ríos Vivos Antioquia, were murdered just last week.
Beyond the role of the Colombian government, investments from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in the Hidroituango project since 2012 have served to legitimize a risky project. In spite of the many problems surrounding Hidroituango, the company has touted the project as fully compliant with the IDB’s environmental and social policies. The IDB currently manages a $1 billion loan package for the Hidroituango project from multiple international banks and has independently provided other loans to the project.
The Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL) supports Movimiento Ríos Vivos Antioquia and the communities in the municipalities of Briceño, Ituango, Toledo, San Andrés de Cuerquia, Valdivia, Sabanalarga, Peque, and Caucasia Antioquia who are impacted by the construction and future operation of the Ituango Hydroelectric Project.
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Contact: Carla Garcia Zendejas, cgarcia@ciel.org, (202) 374-2550