A group of about 20 women holding banners calling for inclusive peace in Colombia. Over 1500 women helped shape Colombia’s national action plan on women peace and security. Photo: UN Women/Juan Camilo Arias
- Cantadora singers in Tumaco rehearse on a rooftop. They are part of a network of singers who use traditional Afro-Colombian music to preserve their culture and promote peace. Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
- Mila Rodriguez, 18, plays the marimba, an instrument used in traditional Afro-Colombian music. "When I listen to a drum, I feel like it’s calling my name. This music is in my veins." Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
- Dama Verde is an economic project in Pondores (Colombia) led by women former guerrilla fighters in process of reintegration. They grow aromatic plants among other crops to sustain their families and contribute to the entire community, as they reintegrate into civilian life after the Peace Agreement with the Colombian Government was signed in 2016. This economic project is supported by UN Women. Photo: UN Women/Pedro Pío
- Cielo Gomez and her family got their land back as part of the land restitution process initiated by the Government of Colombia. Through a UN Women project implemented by Corporation for the Social, technological and economic development of Colombia (CORPDESARROLLO), funded by the Government of Sweden, Cielo learned about her right to land, developed leadership and business skills. Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
- Cielo Gomez with land restitution paperwork received during the process initiated by the Government of Colombia. “There were three lots of land, and now I own one of them, and the other two are under my husband’s name. We grow coffee in all three lots. Both of us are now land owners and that’s economic autonomy,” says a proud Cielo. Since then, she has taken a loan from the bank and bought another piece of land. Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
- Over 1500 women helped shape Colombia’s national action plan on women peace and security. Photo: UN Women/Juan Camilo Arias
- A group of about 20 women holding banners calling for inclusive peace in Colombia. Over 1500 women helped shape Colombia’s national action plan on women peace and security. Photo: UN Women/Juan Camilo Arias
How do women build peace?
One of the most recent milestones in Colombia’s peace process was the 2024 adoption of a national action plan on women, peace and security, in line with a series of UN Security Council resolutions. It builds on a solid foundation: UN Women’s sustained support for over 120 women-led organizations continuously advocating for women’s rights in actions under the 2016 accord. The Colombian women’s movement is pushing for changes that make a real and lasting difference in women’s everyday lives.
Reintegrating ex-combatants: In the aftermath of the peace agreement, UN Women began supporting nearly 3,000 former women combatants in 11 regions to lay down arms and rejoin their families and communities. They have taken up new roles as citizens, students, entrepreneurs, mothers, and political leaders.
Restoring land rights: With a new national law to restore illegally seized land to its rightful owners, UN Women has helped women across the country learn about their rights, gain formal ownership documents, and acquire business and agricultural skills. As Nelly Velandia, a rural leader from central-eastern Colombia, says, “For us, peace is defending the land, food sovereignty, and women's rights. That is what peacebuilding is about.”
Healing and recovery: Continuous psychosocial support assists individuals and communities to recover from trauma, seek justice, and manage continued insecurity in many communities. Along the Pacific Coast, one unique initiative is the UN Women-assisted Cantadora network of singers. It has brought women of all ages together to perform traditional Afro-Colombian music, preserving their culture while promoting peace. The group’s “Song for Freedom” resonates throughout Colombia, symbolizing the power of resistance and hope.
“When we sing, we feel free,” exults Mila Rodriguez, a young member of the network. “Through the lyrics of the songs we sing, we are telling the real stories of our lives. You don’t think about weapons anymore, because your life is filled with music.”
Defending the environmental defenders: Climate change is putting new pressures on peace, fuelling conflict and unrest. At the same time, standing up for nature is increasingly dangerous: In 2023, 79 women human-rights defenders were murdered in Colombia, the highest number anywhere in the world. A new UN Women programme funded by the Government of Germany helps defend these defenders by working with local authorities to protect their rights to lead, advocate and sustain local ecosystems and livelihoods.
Sandra Patricia Aguilar Carabalí, president of the Cauca Department Youth Network (REDEJOCA), explains, “Protecting the environment is not only an act of conservation but also an act of resistance to violence and inequality.”
Justices from the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (Jurisdicción Especial para la Paz, JEP) are responsible for trying cases of human rights violations.
Photo: JEP Colombia
A national plan for women and peace
Colombia’s National Action Plan for women and peace is far from a dry, technocratic endeavor. Such plans are in fact crucial for translating peace on paper to lived experience. Without a plan, actions, budgets and accountability can fall off the wagon. That is why UN Women has pioneered the use of such instruments, now in place in 112 countries and territories worldwide.
In Colombia, over 1,500 women helped shape the National Action Plan that reflects their first-hand experiences with war, including in rural, Afro-Colombian, Indigenous and displaced communities. Over the next 10 years, the plan requires government institutions in every part of the country to make gender equality central to security, recovery and peacebuilding measures. It calls for guarantees of women’s leadership and provisions to end violence against women, among others.
The plan both responds to women’s priorities – and testifies to their continued commitment to a lasting peace.
At last, I have a voice: Women’s role in transitional justice and peacebuilding in Colombia
Colombia’s peace accords triggered a search for justice and healing that continues today.
Among other crimes, over 35,000 people suffered sexual, gender-based or reproductive violence from 1957 to 2016; 90 per cent were women. Over a third were children or adolescents. Their experiences still haunt individuals, families and entire communities.
“The peace agreement clearly states that sexual violence is not pardonable,” says Gloria Gil, from the National Women’s Network. “We see that statement as a guarantee for those women who were victims of rape and similar acts of violence during the conflict. Now women are claiming their right to know the truth. Why were they raped, why were their husbands killed… This is the truth they are looking for.”
One of the most important initiatives for justice and healing has been a collective case for survivors of sexual violence, known as Macro Case 11. It is managed under the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, which emerged from the peace agreement to investigate, prosecute and punish the most serious crimes, guided by a commission on gender. Since 2023, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace has been working with hundreds of victims so that they can participate, testify, and seek justice in the case.
With UN Women’s support, the Colombian Women’s Peace Initiative Alliance reaches even the most remote regions of the country to inform women about the case and support those choosing to testify. It also guides magistrates in travelling to local communities to collect testimonies, a process that both increases access to justice and restores confidence that the judicial system will pursue such crimes.
Ángela Yasmín Cerón Lasprilla, the Director of Justice at the Colombian Women’s Peace Initiative Alliance.
Photo: UN Women/Jose Eduardo Vargas
Ángela Yasmín Cerón Lasprilla, the Director of Justice at the Alliance, stresses the importance of listening to women. “It is supremely valuable,” she says. “People begin to understand that it was not only damage to [the individual] but to society, the community, the person they loved, and their family. It also allows them to think that these damages could have been caused to other women who never wanted to speak or who have never been able to do so out of fear or terror – and that it is necessary to do so.”
She recalls one woman saying, “They raped me, mistreated me, did things to me, but I managed to move forward as a survivor. But they killed my son, and I can’t do anything for him. Now I am finally here. At last, I have a voice. I can demand justice and rights – for him and for me.”
UN Women (and its predecessor agency, UNIFEM) has worked in Colombia since 2005. Our work with women peacebuilders has been generously funded by the governments of Sweden, Norway, Germany, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, Koica, the PBF, the WPHF, the MPTF, the CERF, and several other partners working in Colombia, who recognize the leadership of women in sustaining peace and have committed to actions through the Gender Roundtable of International Cooperation in the country for more than 16 years.
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