surface and far away from our damaging actions. stephanie decker or g 0, a german artist is refusing to accept an award for photography. after admitting the photo he took was generated using artificial intelligence. a picture by boris al dodson depicts to women from different errors using a black and white filter and oxen, one and the creative open category. the sony well photography awards. he says he wanted to spark debate over the role of int, artificial intelligence in art. ah, watching out as they are, these are the main stories. gunfire has still been heard in the sudanese capital despite a cease fire having come into effect 3 and a half hours ago. fighting has persisted for 4 days and a 185 people have been killed. the army and the country's largest paramilitary group, the rapids support forces say they've agreed to

a 24 hour pause in the fighting. but the un says it does not received any indication. the violence has stopped. locals, say explosions, have still been heard, particularly around the military's headquarters and the republican palace. ever morgan has morphin cartoon. now we can hear the sound of artillery being fired or we did, you heard some just a short while ago. so it's clear that be our ongoing battle between the hours of the rapids support forces and the sudanese military is still not over despite the fact that both sides agreed to a cease fire. now we've spoken to people who are in other residential areas as well . we're now in the central part of the capitol, harder to him, but we've spoken to people who live in the northern part of the capital. and they said that they can hear heavy artillery and shelling as well. the presidents of both ukraine and russia visited, war zones, and ukraine. rumors, lensky spoke to troops and awarded medals rather mere putin addressed military leaders in russian occupied territory. he asked for updates on situation in house

on the u. s. journalist evan gosh, greevich has lost an appeal against his pre trial detention. the hearing in moscow was the 1st time the wall street journal reporter had been seen since he was arrested last month by russia. security services is charged with espionage cash, which denies the charges. the leader of chin is yours. main opposition party has been arrested and the parties had quarters rated rashid ganache. he is a main opponent of president k say it is been accused of orchestrating a power grab after he suspended parliament in 2021 hours later. police also arrested 3 other prominent members of the party through the headline send up get you can always catch up with our website that's out there a dot com, the latest on all our top stories. and you can watch us live by clicking on the live icon stream is next asking why columbia is the world's deadliest country for human rights activists. one, if you are to that talk to al jazeera,

we ask who is really fighting this rush of? is it wagner? or is it the russian or military? we listen, we started talking to me on my own, so that yeah, your citizen is look to get him back. we meet with global news makers and talk about the stories that matter on al jazeera. hello, welcome to the stream. i'm josh rushing to day columbia and the dangerous job of being a human rights activist in that country. now what you're seeing here, these are the top 5 countries where human rights activist and social leaders were killed last year. look at columbia. it's at the top, a $186.00 killed. that's according to the latest report from the rights group. frontline defenders. so in today's episode, we look at the reasons why columbia is the world's deadliest country for those

wanting to protect human rights. and what's been done about it. ah, joining us, joining us from bogota, laura benita, deputy director of the perez foundation, that the latin american think tank specializing in conflict analysis. also bogota inigo, alexander. he's a columbia based journalist covering human rights and social justice. and in dublin, ireland. sarah, to war, global head of protection for the rights group. frontline defenders. and as always, you're also at the table. if you're watching this on youtube, check it out. we have a live stream producer waiting there to get your comments to me so i can get them to our guest today and you and i will, we can do this thing together, right. all right, let's begin with laura. why is it so dangerous to be a human rights defender in columbia of all places? well, basically the charge, i'm sorry, is because our long work history and our long down our met conflicts

to be a little bit more clear for the audience columbia. how stop long term conflict for so many years ish, 101520 years. we try to do a piece process. our last piece process was sale. it's the implementation of the agreement. and that creates like the sensation and the feeling. and they are most of the columbia, they can know the competition with nothing. also, that creates a lot of frustration in the sales. and at the same time to age the 5 year support versus what's not really present in the field. and implies that as many our myth groups, any kind of pharma group just starting to grow up in the, especially in the rural area, especially certain areas. so for that kind of our group,

their socio and either ship our enemy. why? because all those are met groups as leaving from the violence day on the light at via them producers and they are the shape and weight saturday, they're violent, so i still she'll either a human slice defenders usually try to stop dot auctions from our mate group. try to speak a no loud devoted to retail console of the bio lancer's american face. so that's why right now for a bad type of violence. no dissertation in columbia. so dramatic for human rights defenders and also for social leaders and something that i think that is really important is that the columbia is very generous with it. we've got the conversation . so for us usually day so shall be theirs. and the human rights defenders

a used to be the same person in the field. and so may be also find that 3 somewhat . you know, one honda that a, he's keisha's but speaking of a 186 cases there, i actually want to put a, a face on some of those names rather than just being numbers. so sarah, your partner, frontline, defenders, we, we've gone to your website here and, you know, just looking at it, it's broken down by country york at columbia and look at these faces, attempted killing new death threat, death, threat killed. let's, let's, let's put, let's just go in on this one here to feel aconia. what can you tell us about him? why was he killed? no think just for, for bringing to fluid to this conversation then definitely i think when we have numbers more than reporting a number of cases, we want to bring the memory of those who are

a kid with story of why they would kill it. so when the keys will still look when he was actually killed together with another defender, short hold on, but still and they were killing the february last year. the 2 of them were company leaders, sometimes in english, not the best thing that happened in the context of latin america company seeing what translates better, the kinds of community rules that they are looking at. so they were to defenders duplicating for land, right, because of a case and for the right to be way to sustain, to have the conditions, to sustain the likelihood. and both of them, i think this is emblematic case because too often and hearty, they actually came up with public denounces about the death threats they were being subjected to. and only 2 days before they would kill, they was again a public that now on the death threats they were being subjected to because of that the now they were making, i guess the role of them on the policy and the local police. so which of them were

actually show that i think front of their family and known, and hugh today, we don't have a response of who are actually responsible for that particular case. i think this is an implement to case because show that those individuals are not on the isolated individuals, but they represent collect to the struggles as a lotta lotta will say, in the context of columbia, how important it is as part of a community to the 1st part of community organize, and i think the keys are often lou again, it also shows the foster off the criminalization of human rights defenders in place of below be. so they offer low was actually the pain in 2020. and that shows a story like he was saying he received that stress. and then finally he was which i think for the lack of effective protection for human rights to send. there's a tree in that conference. and then another case that we wanted to look into an ego, can you tell us about this 14 year old boy who was killed in galka?

yeah, that case was one that really struck according to clear last year to page $31.00 in the year in january. right. at the start of the year. he's one of the 1st few him, right defenders in particular case environmental defender to who was murdered. and the strike thing about the cases is age was just 14 shot dead in the region of telecom and south south west of the country. and he was murdered when he was taking part in the traditional patrol of the indigenous territory, which he lived. and he's part of the indigenous guard, which is but a national organization. so no non group and de tustin selves with trying to protect their own territory and trying to defend the community and the causes from potential threats and risk. because a lot of those, the business committed to live in areas of the country which are heavy presence of our groups. and as a consequence, suffer quite a lot of tradition violence and he was unfortunately killed when they were ambushed

. his patrol was ambushed him and he was going on with his father who i believe survived, but another member was also killed. and they just faced open fire in the small rural area of, of galico when they were just trying to troll and, and provide a minimum degree of protection and insecurity to hon. communities. they heard that there was a legit presence of armed groups in the community for the patrol went down to try and see what was going on and just try and see if they could come down situation or at least provide some degree of protection to the communities and as a result they, they just and young thing that unfortunate all killed just goes to show a lot of the, a lot of the killings are just on, you know, i'm bridled on talking to the tax that just take lines of you know, some people like like dana, who is 14 year old, who was just taking part of his patrol and tried to defend his community and tried to force as well and the environment. and as

a result of being part of that patrol in that community, he was so that was the case that insecurity, district court and the last year. yeah. the i want to make clear cuz we're talking about him patrolling to defend his community. i want our audience to understand. they were not armed. it was just not a sickly. they're present there. right? yeah, yeah, exactly. a dog park and yes, sorry. nichol. i yes, i was to say the indigenous god is is as just were saying not in our group and then on pacific group and they just stuff patrol the areas just provides the minimum level of safety and security from those threats which as i mentioned before and a lot of the indigenous areas on groups have quite a heavy right. right. so just the presence of arms, of sort of unarmed, rather indigent patrols. hey guys, how to turn that? yeah, i want to bring in a some reporting. this is done by my friend and colleague alessandro rashadi, who's down in boca ta reports from columbia for al jazeera english on our new side

. and he interviewed oscar some peo, who's environmental activist from there, and i want to share this piece of video. oscar told us that he's been threatened by criminals. he claims are responsible for dumping toxic waste in agricultural or protected areas near to city of but lack of better me. her the government. this provided him with a day time body guard a flat jacket and a panic button. but he says the security measures are no match for the armed groups who operate with impunity. which as a soda, we escape the government institution. they should be recourse like the regional attorney, general inspector general, the ombudsman, or from that the other way because they have been collected by the criminal group. c. r, lora, there's a couple things i want to touch on there. eventually want to move to impunity, which has brought up idea of it. but even before that, i think it was in your pre interview. you told us something along the lines that

the violence is the economy. yes. can you, can you explain the height of? yes. so many people, especially in, i used to work with a swedish organization for so many d as a most of the people outside columbia. believe that this is i, me showed one, you know, an above medical sir. it be for any legal economy and the solution to all of that is just of you know, and our 5 day legal economies of the cream and i'll economies they point here is that we don't have the same conflict that another cone please. with that, of course we, they are on maybe the bus, but where, you know, we have been that of course in one place we have out of met groups, shelly vial inserted. so basically all the groups go really as far, many tardies private army groups are sally like a therapy. so filed some protection. so i personally know some part,

michael leak and i am from the same region. so what is the point with that? this is a pretty good case to explain their socio and be theirs and mental be theirs are again, you know, some kind of condemnation. so people who are constantly, they think they are not taking no direct. second is the leaders. they hire some group or de, give money to some group, and that group for us in the region. this is a petroleum region that group doesn't need to move and are called 16 and the place of the concert sound country for them. it's more easier to go with today, the economy of petroleum calling on me all for any kind of oil and then, oh gee, and try to extract that resources calling them. and if you just finish, they're not put off right now. we are in a high crisis economic crisis. no,

not, it's not now a good business. columbia people are suffering in the field. you know, they don't have anything to buy a cup of crops. so why are we still define this? because the 2nd group that we know that before of these crisis, they were buying things and they were buying the coca leech and that's the thing. groups are trying to equally stay around, you know, using their extortion. oh, and that explain, why are these groups are just to read the real concern and better we could have consort if he of these new conflict in columbia. i mean, generally like in america. well, want to bring in some voices from you to for watching the shell right now. this is from youtube or man, says drugs is the most important problem and columbia. and then um, okay, whatever, so this at that their name not mine,

says i'm wondering to what extent do people there know about the idea of human rights. it seems at least they know there's a concept of human rights before. therefore they have so many activists standing up . ah, and then there was one about impunity in, oh, is this because or no effect of state institutions that's from brian filter. now we're going to answer these questions. but 1st, i want to bring in one more video comment from our community. this is from andrew miller, is the ag advocacy director at amazon watch. the petro administration has placed human rights defenders in very important positions of influence. for example, the vice president, frontier marquez, also the piece commissioner, danny looked away the among others. those individuals, however, are facing entrenched systems of impunity. for example, the fiscal handed al columbia's attorney general francisco barbosa has not demonstrated the political will to investigate and hold accountable government officials responsible for human rights violations. one example is the algebra man,

so massacre from last year in which colombian counter narcotics units killed 11 people, including community leaders and a key tra, indigenous governor. to date, an investigation has not been carried out and officials have not been held accountable. inigo, why are people being held to account for these murders? yeah, that's a long standing issue that columbus had the ramp and impunity. and they inefficient in the inefficiency. so in this regard, a lot of it is down to the fact that i believe the groups that are often times carrying out these kings, they know they can get a, you know, they can get away with them. they know that they're operating in areas where they are basically the de facto government. and they can do as a clean, especially in terms of dealing with a opposition voices or any resistance when you elicit economies. so there has been a long history of impunity. and i just wanted to bring up

a point that something that i mentioned is a video which is the state protection system. they have a national protection unit part, the ministry of interior here in columbia, which provides protection to people into threats. people who are under the harm, but that's basically the go to mechanism and it's not an effective one. last year was given a budget of just over a $1000000.00, i believe, which in the grants can think there's not a lot. and it's also a very inefficient, very slow process. i've spoken to a number defenders who are allegedly protected under that program, but have voice for months and months and months and months received that section. and the protection is fairly minimal immigrants going to think again, like i mentioned in the video, maybe that proof that maybe a driver might not do desk a building on what you had the we have dealt with cases in which people were threatened by those were supposed to be protecting them in the program. so that means the problem has a number of limitations and i think in the context of columbia,

it's really important to think to then to exactly who are those defenders who have been killed when we look at this number of 186 cases are the case has been collect, verify that in the case of columbia, very important innovation to some of the studies come up with the numbers and the breakdown. so when we opened those numbers, when we're looking at, we are looking at 4 to 0 percent of them are indigenous people. and we are looking at 7 to 2 out of those a 186 cases where people involved with the monopolies, which means people who actually took up a leadership role in the very, very local levels. so people who are involved on community organizing on lands, right, which is evidence thing, the fact that those protection mechanisms don't reach those most isolated community, which means the protection mechanism are not accessible where they are most need that know you can access it, but it's not everywhere it's not consistent across the counter,

so i think you got flight as correctly. and i'm sure loud also has been when you're talking about the ineffectiveness of this protection system. i want you to know we reached out for video comments from colombia, and some of the people were really too scared to put their face on camera. so we had this comment, this is from one who's a guzman is a climate justice activist in new york city. i can forward to you on behalf of a community i'm very fond of in northern columbia. they are chosen not to show their faces because they feel threatened by aren't groups and the region. these groups are establishing new territorial control over disputed lands between peasants. indigenous communities, and tourist development in northern columbia. these groups are only enticing violence, but seek to control this land to be able to carry weapons to traffic drugs, and to be able to exploit natural resources such as land was. and

mine's local communities have gone. have come forward to the government asking for support and for help the local authorities fear these armed groups and the central colombian government has so far remain silent. laura, what can be done? what should be done? yeah, well this will be maybe this will sound simple, but this not simple to do that. we know 1st they infinity have a lot to do with this are center. so people in bacteria cannot use the lock hello. starting to protect themselves, so they have to call to go. they have to look for a deals, they have to look for another institutions to help them to get protection that they need. in the 2nd place, people for instance, do, are talking about the telecom,

telecom is the most dramatic situation right now for indigenous people, especially for women. so, we meant indigenous women in color. if they want to implement a collective, wrote a protection, they need to go over stuff because that they don't have the capacity feet or the interest to do something really effective. and that could take a lot of time because our bill rocha, she and also because our russian core broke chinese close connect with violence in columbia. and this is really important because it's like, were they ok based fissions. but recently, you and i, you know, they, us, the national politics young. this will be a bit thread against a bit, but not the threat of back against the director. so the director try to control the corruption within institution and he was safe a bit

a back. wow. so basis level of to know, but i see them better have a break with will about human wise defenders. but the government needs to understand and if we don't be or a local capacity farsi will society. and for the local estate, we are not doing something really effective. on the 2nd one of the ent unity of course, of course, and do anything something that's an increase the damocles of the situation. but if they bought our mac groups $12.00, he like the retail council, it will be very difficult to cough another solution. we're starting to run low on time. and i also want to look at maybe what's international community should be aware of in this situation. so i want to bring in a video comment. this is from shrewd d. suresh said land and environment defenders campaign to lee for global witness. the colombian government must now turn commitments into action. global witness

analysis has found that columbia is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for environmental defenders are angio pot. not so most defense stories has this week reported that the families of over 1300 defenders killed in the country are still waiting for justice. we need urgent action from the government to end this culture of impunity, which is fueling for the alliance against offenders. the also need the u. s. e u, in other countries in the global not to ensure that their private sector businesses in columbia do not contribute to human rights abuses faced by defenders. so sarah, i also want to bring in a comment from you tube here. this is from kyle marston says whatever aide united states provides needs to stop involving handing out munitions and fire arms. and i noticed that last video comment, she talked about the global north needs to be aware of contributing to the

situation. can you talk from an international perspective of what the international community needs to do here to support columbia? no, definitely. i think if there is enough back to engage, that's the rule of the pieces and the private sector might. they might not be directly engaged on the violence, but the truth is they, they are business are being benefited by the fact that defenders are those suspending on the ways for the implementation destructive allow or destructive big projects in columbia. so those business has benefits for the fact that those a friend that have been taking out of the way have been forced this place from the community. i think in that case of columbia, if they reuse the civil society who has the deep knowledge and deep political understanding of the issues of protection is the civil sites in columbia. so i don't think we have knowledge to offer what we have to offer is solidarity is support to sustain the livelihoods of those communities. because ultimately those

human rights defenders are a duplicate and being killers for the fun thing, the ways of believing for different communities. so i think one thing can actually can, when it has to do in the end of the day to support the likelihood of those communities and of course a duplicate and support bay and that's worked for for the better for better protection. and i think if we can, if it is that can be a massive issue on the challenge of protection, we have the absence of the state in the different parts of the country. and also the critical role that human rights defenders are plain still in the absence of the country that the state for the implementation of the peace agreement. the fact that the failures i put in the south in the front line of the peace agreement, the fact that human rights, the centers in can, we are taking up the ro simply meant the beast that's so important for them means that they have to take a 3, sir, this is that this is the final 2nd for the show. thank you so much for those final

words on this. we'll keep watching this story here at al jazeera english. you can always find as it's stream that al jazeera dot com, thanks for, ah ah, and a inequality, corruption, repression and rate a political, it just decided to cut to the piece of cake. i'm sure it won't be a documentary explores the desperate stage of democracy in lebanon

a through the eyes of those who are losing hope every day our dreams are becoming blue. democracy maybe democracy for sale on al jazeera, the sorbs, i believe, to have my greatest in the 6th century, from the co pay thi, and mountains in central europe to these forest and present a germany tens of thousands to live in this region. how far from the polish and checked borders every year as east of martina hoffman tries to preserve disobedient tradition of painting like her answer. so she gets the x, the con symbols. it's special back to just for good health, happiness and prosperity. this archive manager preserve their culture for over a 1000 years, mainly because they live quite isolated along the way staff survived the wars communism naziism. but now that knowledge threatening native language in 5 for a broad takes on the big issues. this is not one off, he's talking about

a systemic issue here. black labs don't really matter in the police were unflinching. is war with one to minute rigorous debate? people were dying because of lack of medical treatment, challenging conventional with the fact that people are starting to get angry about it in itself. a sign of program. join me, mark of mine who for up front on algebra. ah, i am learn taylor in under the top stories are now janera. gunfire still been heard in the sudanese capital despite a ceasefire. having come into effect 4 and a half hours ago. fighting has persisted for 4 days an 185 people have been killed . the army and the country's largest paramilitary group, the rapids support forces say they've agreed to 24 paws in the fighting. but the un says it does not received any indication. the violence has stopped.