E/CN.4/2005/88/Add.2 page 5 Introduction and background 1. Pursuant to Commission on Human Rights resolution 2001/57 of 24 April 2001, which established his mandate, and at the invitation of the Colombian Government, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people visited Colombia from 8 to 17 March 2004. 2. The Special Rapporteur would like to thank the Government of Colombia and in particular the Office of Ethnic Affairs of the Ministry of the Interior, for their assistance before and during his visit. Special thanks are due to the many indigenous organizations for the interest they showed in his visit and for their cooperation. He also commends the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Colombia for its excellent work and the extensive and varied schedule of meetings it prepared. 3. Officially, there are 84 indigenous peoples in Colombia, with a total population of around 785,000; some estimates put the figure at around 1 million, however, with more than 90 ethnic groups. They are spread through all the departments of the country, which makes for great demographic and cultural diversity. Three peoples, the Wayuu, the Paez and the Embera, have over 50,000 members, while more than 30 communities have fewer than 500. They include farmers, gatherers and fisherfolk, rural indigenous communities and small nomadic groups. There is also a growing urban indigenous population. 4. Colombia’s indigenous peoples have enjoyed something of a revival in recent years, for various reasons, including the restoration of their homelands, their increasing integration into the life of the nation and the emergence of organizations committed to the defence of indigenous rights and of leaders capable of establishing objectives for self-development and autonomy. In addition, Colombia has a constitutional, legislative and institutional framework designed in part to protect indigenous peoples’ individual and collective rights, promote their economic and social development and foster their cultural identity. 5. Now, however, Colombia’s indigenous people find themselves in a serious, critical and profoundly worrying human rights situation. A great many communities suffer from the unrelieved violence of an armed conflict that has a significant impact on their daily lives. The actual physical and cultural survival of some of the more vulnerable indigenous communities, particularly those in the Amazon region, is threatened. 6. Despite the existence of a protective legal framework, the rule of law is being undermined by a consistent pattern of violations of the human rights of indigenous peoples and communities, attributable in part to the dynamics of the internal conflict, the establishment in many parts of the country of illegal armed groups with links to regional and local political power structures, and the powerful economic interests associated with drug trafficking and the exploitation of natural resources. It needs to be said that some of the actions taken in the past year as part of the military strategy to combat subversion and terrorism have also given rise to allegations of human rights violations in several parts of the country.