Based on extensive fieldwork and an investigation of supply chains, tracing minerals from extraction to international buyers, we reveal how the global race for the inputs of the energy transition is intensifying violent disputes along the Colombia–Venezuela border, where armed groups control the territory, commit systematic abuses, and destroy one of the planet’s most important carbon sinks.
Category: Colombia
Colombia declares itself the first nation in the Amazon with its entire forest free from oil and mining activities
Colombia’s minister of environment and sustainable development, Irene Vélez Torres, made the announcement Thursday (Nov. 13) at a meeting of Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO) ministers during COP30.
Indigenous communities in the Colombian Amazon decry oil pollution and threats posed by guerrillas
President Gustavo Petro pledged to halt oil and gas exploration in the Amazon. However, Colombia faces a complex challenge, with the oil industry, armed groups, and Indigenous communities vying for control of the same territories.
The Amazon rainforest emerges as the new global oil frontier
Half a century of oil exploration has left the world’s largest rainforest scarred by deforestation, water contamination and air pollution. Indigenous lands have been infringed and economic disparities exacerbated. Now a new wave of drilling threatens to perpetuate this destructive legacy.
How did we investigate oil data in the Amazon?
Por Renata Hirota April 1, 2025 This story is part of the special series EVERY LAST DROP Since July 2024, the cross-border project Every Last Drop has investigated and mapped available data on oil and gas exploration across the Amazon, focusing on the biome’s reach into Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, and Peru. The analysis used […]
Colombian and Ecuadorian criminal groups expand their violent influence throughout the Amazon
By Plan V* The Comandos de la Frontera, a Colombian armed group that also operates in northern Ecuador, and the Ecuadorian gang Los Choneros have imposed a regime of terror in the Amazonian provinces of Sucumbíos and Orellana, although the alliances between them are unclear. One of the illegal activities that has grown the most […]
Colombian companies defy laws, push Amazon carbon projects in Indigenous lands
Without proper consultation, leaders were persuaded to accept a carbon project on indigenous lands in the Amazon, with the promise that the money would fund a university in the villages; Funai (National Indian Foundation) was unaware of pre-contracts and states that negotiations may be annulled.
Drug gangs threaten communities in Amazon ‘cocaine corridor’
Indigenous, African-descended and other traditional communities are caught in escalating violence from drug trafficking in Amazon “cocaine corridor.”
In Venezuela, Colombian guerrillas recruit Indigenous youth
Along border with Venezuela, Colombian guerrillas lure unemployed Indigenous youths into drug trade, extortion rackets and armed conflict.
Colombian drug runners turn to shamans for protection
Before embarking on a perilous trek through the jungle, drug couriers in Colombia turn to shamans for protection.