ADES
The Economic and Social Development “Santa Marta” Association (ADES) is an association with more than 30 years working for the development of the Santa Marta community, whose inhabitants were violently displaced at the beginning of the 1980s and who later returned at the end of the same decade. Since its creation in 1993, the ADES has been working in favour of the Santa Marta community by the development of programs and mechanisms to ensure basic education, alphabetization, community organization, defence of the environment, legal support, community health and, in general, the network for commercialization and infrastructure projects. At a national level, the ADES stands out for actively participating in the process of articulation of different organizations that are now part of the National Board against Metallic Mining, supporting the approval by unanimity of the Law that Prohibits Metallic Mining in March of 2017.
The human rights defender community is regularly subjected to campaigns of defamation - they are labeled as 'traitors of the nation', 'terrorists' and 'subversive'. This tactic employed by the authorities is designed to discredit and undermine the work of human rights defenders by isolating and marginalising them, making them a vulnerable target for abuse. Community leaders and environmental activists who are opposed to large-scale mining projects face death threats and violence.
