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Environmentalist Yuli Velásquez: She survived three murder attempts
Colombian fishermen are threatened by many criminal groups. Environmentalist Yuli Velásquez calls for international support. more...
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She survived three murder attempts. Now Yuli Velásquez's life is threatened again. She is president of the Association of Small-Scale Fishermen of Santander (Fedepesan) in northeastern Colombia. This year she was awarded the Colombian Human Rights Prize, and in 2024 she was awarded that of Amnesty International Germany.
Yuli Velásquez received a call during a training course for small business owners. At the other end, according to his own statement, was Jhon Jairo Fernández Pórtala, alias “Marihuano”. The man is in custody on suspicion of multiple murders and is the head of the drug gang “Los de la M”. Marihuano threatened her with death if she didn't show up to a meeting and pay protection money. This was followed by threatening messages via Whatsapp from the same number. María Teresa Beltrán, Fedepesan's inspector, experienced a similar situation.
Yuli Velásquez is a fisherman and qualified environmental engineer. Your association Fedepesan works closely with the local human rights organization CREDHOS. They repeatedly accused the state-owned company Ecopetrol of polluting the lakes and swamps, although it denied this. They reported cases of corruption, for example in the awarding of contracts for the restoration of water bodies by Ecopetrol and the regional environmental authority CAS.
Guerrillas and paramilitaries have also been threatening fishermen for decades. Because of this, several people left their homeland. Some were murdered and their bodies thrown into bodies of water. Yuli Velásquez and her family have been living under close protection for years. Two weeks before the latest death threat, gunmen harassed fishermen who were documenting dead manatees. Unknown people were sneaking around their houses, documented by surveillance cameras.
Yuli Velásquez spoke clearly about the threats in a meeting with the People's Ombudsman and the Public Prosecutor's Office. There are currently so many criminal groups that they don't even know who is threatening them. This makes the support of the international community and human rights organizations all the more important.
According to the organization Global Witness 2025, Colombia was once again the deadliest country in the world for environmentalists.