Colombia: Illegal Mining, Logging and Coca Cultivation Are Ravaging Colombia’s National Parks

Jun 29, 2016 | James Bargent, Earth Island Journal
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Colombia’s national parks were created as both a showcase for the country’s spectacular biodiversity and as a protected refuge for its delicate ecosystems. But in recent years, they have instead become a haven for criminal activities that are leaving a trail of environmental devastation. The parks are also home to guerrilla insurgents and criminalized paramilitary groups that have been drawn to the wilds by the lucrative prospect of exploiting coca crops and cocaine production and illegal mining and logging. The invasion of these underworld networks has been accompanied by ecological destruction and contamination that threatens the future of some of Colombia’s most fragile protected areas.