Inmates from La Tramacúa attended a peace-building workshop

Deprived of their liberty in the Valledupar High and Medium Security Penitentiary, known as La Tramacúa, they participated in a workshop given by the Mission to Support the Peace Process in Colombia of the Organization of American States (MAPP/OAS), called “Dialogues, conflict transformation, constructive communication and negotiation.”

The attendees are part of the Peace Table of the prison center, who have been working in this area for several years.

“A fundamental point of this type of spaces is to see people with humanity, to see all people deprived of liberty as human beings, who are transformers of conflicts and can be potential builders and creators of peace in their territories,” he said. Daniel Millares, Coordinator of the Justice Area of ​​the MAPP/OAS.

For their part, participants in the training and members of the Peace Roundtable indicated that, “We are organized in a Peace Roundtable, from there we began to generate spaces with some international organizations, such as the MAPP/OAS, which is training us. in the development of political improvements to generate coexistence within our communities, in our backyards. We met and understood that it is the opportunity and it is time to start making a change, to show the country that violence is not the way, we want to contribute so that we all live in peace.”

Additionally, they mentioned that with this strengthening of capacities, they achieve a collaborative alliance between areas of the MAPP/OAS, to support and strengthen skills, which are a sign that tolerance, reconciliation and the comprehensive contribution of people who have experienced the armed expressions to address situations.

“This initiative in this prison of people who show an attitudinal change and a willingness to serve peace, to contribute to peace in all its dimensions,” said Herbert Ortega Pinto, coordinator of the capacity area for conflict transformation of the MAPP/OAS.

Likewise, the participants recognized that scenarios like these enhance their skills to put them at the service of the Peace Table, allow them to retransmit the acquired knowledge to others and facilitate spaces for dialogue with the institutions. They also expressed their interest in similar training being replicated in other penitentiary centers to demonstrate that it is possible to find oneself in the same scenario, beyond different ideologies and thoughts, with the common purpose of building peace through dialogue.

«The MAPP/OAS is doing important work for the penitentiary system, through the initiatives they carry out with all the people who are deprived of their liberty, who are voluntarily participating in all these training processes. Furthermore, it is a work to humanize the penitentiary system and dignify all the people who make up this system,” said the General Director of INPEC, Daniel Fernando Gutiérrez Rojas, about the workshop.

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