Amaryllis Fox

Amaryllis Fox Instagram – $10.5bn in US military aid and a quarter of a million Colombians dead. Still more cocaine flowed out of Colombia last year than ever before. The costs of the war on drugs are many — human rights, environmental protections, economic prosperity — all lost to violence and greed.
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We spent this week down in Bogotá, Cali and Buenaventura in an attempt to document and understand the drivers and impact of the war on drugs. We embedded with the Colombian military. We talked with street kids amid grinding poverty and the threat of violence from narcotraffickers and gangs. We spoke with the women who have lost the most in this war — the mothers, sisters, wives of the disappeared. And we trekked through the jungle to share a meal with farmers driven to grow coca at the mercy of the cartels.
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For our $10.5 bn, we could have funded roads and infrastructure projects that would have connected those rural Colombian farms to the markets that make crop substitution viable, empowering entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to build this country’s future. Instead, we spent it on military intervention. And today the problem is bigger than before we started. Violence thrives on violence. Narcotraffickers and paramilitaries welcome the opportunity war offers them to grab more territory and raise the prices of their product. Only investment in the promise of people can be a light in the midst of that darkness. Give a community a road, a school, a satellite and you give it freedom from dependency on warlords and thugs. That is the power of hope and it is alive and shining in this beautiful land.
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Reflecting on the strength and resilience of the Colombian people as I get ready to fly home. May we support their dreams and invest in their tomorrow. Knowing that in so doing, we invest in our own.
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#peacepays | Posted on 10/Oct/2018 09:50:07