The Creating Safer Space project ‘Exploring unarmed civilian self-protection in Cameroon’s Anglophone conflict’ has published a policy brief, Strengthening Unarmed Community Self-protection in Cameroon’s Anglophone Conflict. The policy brief is written by Dr Nancy Annan and Prof. Gordon Crawford, and it demonstrates the resilience, resourcefulness, and pro-activeness of civilians in protecting themselves in Cameroon’s Anglophone conflict. It advocates that external bodies, both national and international, should learn from these protective measures adopted by local actors, and provide appropriate support.

The Creating Safer Space network is excited to be part of the UCP/A Community of Practice, which brings together people and organisations around the world that are practicing, researching and promoting Unarmed Civilian Protection and Accompaniment. We are delighted that Prof. Berit Bliesemann de Guevara, Creating Safer Space Principal Investigator, has become a member of the UCP/A Community of Practice Steering Group.

The UCP/A Community of Practice, with support from Creating Safer Space, has recently published a Report on its last international gathering, which took place in Geneva in October 2023. The report is available in English, Spanish and French.

The Creating Safer Space network has shown a series of films as part of the WOW Wales One World Film Festival, and these are still available to view online.

The WOW Film Festival is the only UK festival dedicated principally to films from Africa, Asia & Latin America, and this is its 23rd year of bringing international films to cinemas across Wales.

This year the WOW Film Festival included 9 short films that have been produced as part of Creating Safer Space research projects in Colombia, Nigeria and Palestine.

The films were shown in Aberystwyth Arts Centre, Wales. Two of the sessions included discussions with the Principal Investigators of the projects that created two of the films, Dr Marwan Darweish for Civil protection to stay on our land (Palestine) and Dr Pier Parisi for Survive among violence: Stories of the Nasa people in Colombia. More information about the films here.

The films and recordings of the discussions are being shown online until 31 May – book here with free admission!

The Creating Safer Space Exhibition was on display in Aberystwyth Arts Centre in Wales from 11 – 28 March.

Two students from the Department of International Politics at Aberystwyth University worked as Exhibition Tour Guides. Emily Pomeroy is a first year PhD student, and Konstantinos Kolokotronis is a Master’s student. They provided tours to groups of university students and members of the public. A diverse range of visitors viewed the exhibition, and were moved by the stories and the artwork. Most heard about unarmed civilian protection for the first time.

A special exhibition event, attended by approximately 80 people, was held on the evening of Friday 22 March, with wine, food and live music. In her opening remarks, Angela Hatton, Aberystwyth University Pro Vice-Chancellor of Research, Knowledge Exchange and Innovation, discussed the importance of the Creating Safer Space network in the context of the increasing need for civilian protection around the world. Patrick Finney, the Head of Department of International Politics, highlighted the Creating Safer Space network’s difficult journey (born during Covid and affected by subsequent funding instability) and the pleasure in now seeing the network’s achievements as part of the exhibition and its contributions to the WOW Film Festival.

The Creating Safer Space project ‘Exploring unarmed civilian self-protection in Cameroon’s Anglophone conflict’ has published a booklet with poetry and drawings, entitled: “Ji se a-nta-av” Resilient Voices: An anthology of poems on community unarmed protection from a war zone, edited by Mutia Brendaline. The poems and drawings are all written and drawn by civilians living amidst the current conflict in the English-speaking North West and South West regions of Cameroon. An introduction is provided by Prof. Gordon Crawford, the Principal Investigator of the project, who highlights how “[t]he poems’ authors (anonymous to protect their security) outline their experiences, hardships and traumas, as well as their courage, resilience and agency in protecting themselves and others against violence.”

The Creating Safer Space project ‘Understanding Community-level Spontaneous Unarmed Civilian Protection (UCP): A Comparative Study of Initiatives in South Sudan, Myanmar and Colombia’, has published a policy brief based on their research in Nariño, Colombia, entitled ‘Civilians Protecting Civilians’. The policy brief was launched at an event in London that included the participation of the Ambassador of Colombia to the UK and officials from the UK Foreign Office, who reflected on the recommendations provided. The policy brief was published by Rodeemos el Diálogo and written by Karen Arteaga Garzón and Andrei Gómez-Suárez, with illustrations by Sebastián Bucheli. The policy brief is available in English and Spanish.

The Creating Safer Space network held a three-day final regional research forum in Bangkok, Thailand, from 20 – 22 February 2024. The event was hosted by the Faculty of Political Science at Chulalongkorn University.

The research forum was organized to bring researchers and other stakeholders together to share research findings, unique research methodologies, and implications of the research findings for violence prevention and peacebuilding initiatives.

Each of the 8 Creating Safer Space projects in South-East Asia sent at least two representatives to the event, and the event brought together about 50 participants in total. The participants exchanged research findings and enthusiastically discussed ideas about how to create safer spaces for people living in areas of violent conflict.

Participants were also able to visit the Creating Safer Space exhibition. The exhibition brings together objects, images, and voices to show how civilians around the world harness the power of nonviolence to create safer spaces for a dignified life.

More information about the event will be available on the Creating Safer Space website in due course.

This is the second of our three final events. The final event for Africa and the Middle East took place in Kenya in January and we are now very pleased to share more information about this event on our website, along with recordings from the event. The final event for Latin America will take place in Colombia in June.

The Creating Safer Space project ‘Development of civil protection capacities in women displaced by the armed conflict through popular communication and Community Legal Empowerment’ is holding an event at the La Casona Public Library in Cali, Colombia, at 3.30 pm on Thursday 14 March to disseminate the transmedia booklet developed as part of the research project.

The event will be specifically aimed at women who actively participated in the research. It will be an opportunity to recognize their valuable contribution as agents of change in promoting peaceful civil protection in communities affected by armed conflict. The focal point of the event will be a panel discussion where the participating women will have the opportunity to share their experiences in civil protection and the co-creation process of the booklet. In addition to the delivery to the participants, a donation of some copies of the booklet will be made to the La Casona Public Library. This donation aims to facilitate access to educational materials for all library users, thus contributing to the dissemination of knowledge about civil protection in the community.

The transmedia booklet is available for download here.

The Creating Safer Space project ‘Civilian (Self-) Protection from Violent Conflict in Papua: Exploring Local Infrastructures and Initiatives’ published an opinion peace in the Jakarta Post, entitled ‘A new approach to violent conflict in Papua’, on 5 March 2024. The article is written by Arfiansyah and Delsy Ronnie, and it argues that recognizing and allowing a nonpartisan third party to focus solely on protecting civilians from violent conflict could be a stepping stone to conflict management in Papua. The article is available here:

https://www.thejakartapost.com/opinion/2024/03/05/a-new-approach-to-violent-conflict-in-papua.html

The article is currently only available to subscribers of Jakarta Post, but please contact creating-safer-space@aber.ac.uk if you would like to connect with the authors to learn more about their research.

As part of the WOW Wales One World Film Festival the Creating Safer Space research network will be showing films from our research projects around the world. The films will be shown at Aberystwyth Arts Centre in Wales on the dates specified below, and will also be shown online from 22–31 March (booking opening soon).

La Fiesta

10.00 am on Wednesday 20 March, Aberystwyth Arts Centre

La Fiesta is a piece inspired by the findings of the research project Art That Protects and performed by Harlequin and the Jugglers. Witnessed by 600 spectators at the renowned Pablo Tobón Uribe Theatre of Medellín on 17 May 2023, this magical piece transported the audience into a realm of wonder. Among them were members of artistic-cultural organizations from vulnerable urban areas, underscoring the transformative power of art in communities affected by urban violence.

Water Conflicts

4.00 pm on Friday 22 March, Aberystwyth Arts Centre

We will show short films that explore rivers and the filmmakers’ relationships with them, the social / environmental problems that surround them, and our responses to this. The event will include screening of the films and an informal discussion between filmmakers, artists, and activists.

Water Conflicts

These three films emerged from a research project that explored water conflicts around the rivers La Paloma (Argelia), Santo Domingo (San Francisco) and Dormilón (San Luis) in the Oriente region of the department of Antioquia, Colombia. Peasant communities and organizations in the region have a history of social mobilization against extractivist projects such as hydroelectric power plants, mining, and construction works in protected areas. These projects, often backed by armed actors, have changed the landscape and agricultural lifestyle of many municipalities. Community self-protection in these contexts includes cultivating social practices and relationships aimed at caring for water and life. These films were produced as part of the research project Water conflicts, violations and forms of self-protection.

Cutting the Crap

This session will also include a showing of Cutting the Crap, which was produced independently of the Creating Safer Space network. Details TBC.

nodens

This session will also include a showing of nodens, which was produced independently of the Creating Safer Space network by aim king, PhD student at Aberystwyth University’s Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies. nodens (2023) follows Afon Hafren from source to mouth, exploring what is both strange and familiar through walking with river ecologies. It expresses the feeling of knowing and unknowing, continuously, and simultaneously, with the ever-changing iterations of water.

Exhibition

Participants are welcome to join a Special Event of the Creating Safer Space Exhibition that will take place directly afterwards.

Stories of Unarmed Civilian Protection

2.30 pm on Sunday 24 March, Aberystwyth Arts Centre

This series of films is about civilians harnessing the power of nonviolence to create safer spaces for a dignified life. Drawing from real-life experiences in Colombia, Nigeria, and Palestine, these films are born from projects commissioned by the Creating Safer Space research network. Developed collaboratively by academics, communities, and accompaniers, they delve into the practice of unarmed civilian protection, showcasing historical resistance and innovative approaches to imagining, implementing, and sustaining peace. We are excited to also be hearing from two of the principal investigators who initiated the creation of the films:

Dr Marwan Darweish is the Principal Investigator of the project Safety and dignity: Enhancing unarmed civilian protection amongst Palestinian communities in the South Hebron Hills (Masafer Yatta).

Dr Piergiuseppe Parisi is the Principal Investigator of the project ‘Ritualising’ protection in conflict: A collaborative visual ethnography of the cultural and spiritual protection practices of the Nasa people in Colombia

Survive among violence. Stories of the Nasa people in Colombia

The Nasa ancestral people of Colombia have lived amidst the Colombian armed conflict for decades. Armed groups, illicit economies, and economic conglomerates target them, jeopardising their survival, and endangering their ways of life. Through Ana Deida, a Nasa woman leader from Resguardo de Huellas Caloto, the Ritualising Protection project team journeys to understand the risks faced by the community and their historical resistance processes. This film was produced as part of the research project ‘Ritualising’ protection in conflict.

Minga

This film explores the history and meaning of a community-based socio-cultural and political practice known as Minga, an indigenous form of protest and resistance. The film looks at Minga in the context of armed conflict through the experiences of resistance of the Nasa indigenous communities in the department of Cauca, Colombia. It was created by a group of local researchers from the Indigenous Community of Caldono, Resguardo San Lorenzo, Ancestral land Sath Tama Kiwe in 2023. This film was produced as part of the research project Community strategies for Unarmed Civilian Protection in South-West Colombia.

Civil protection to stay on our land: Palestine

Produced by local film makers, this film documents the experience of Palestinian farmers and shepherds with civil protection in the South Hebron Hills (Masafer Yatta). It explores the efficacy of unarmed civilian protection and how to strengthen self-protection against the threats of expulsion and dispossession by Israel and the settlers. This film was produced as part of the research project Safety and dignity: Enhancing unarmed civilian protection amongst Palestinian communities in the South Hebron Hills (Masafer Yatta).

Caring for community life

In Caring for Community Life, the Senú indigenous people of the Almendros 2 reservation in El Bagre, one of the municipalities hardest hit by armed violence in Colombia, tell how they have been organizing to resist armed groups and remain in their ancestral territories. This film was produced as part of the research project The Social Process of Guarantees of Antioquia, Colombia, an experience of unarmed civil protection with indigenous and peasant communities of Bajo Cauca.

Inter-regional learning on UCP in Nigeria (Online Only)

This video captures insights from an intergenerational and collective impact model adopted by the Jos Stakeholder’s Centre for Peace in Jos, Nigeria, to reduce violence in the context of two communities, Angwan Damisa and Balakaze, that have witnessed several episodes of communal conflict. The insights could help other Nigerian communities adapt the model to reduce or prevent violence in their specific context, such as in Maiduguri where ex-Boko Haram fighters and internally displaced persons (IDPs) are returning and changing the composition of the communities. This film was produced as part of the research project Unarmed civilian protection through collective impact.

For more information and to book, please see the WOW Film Festival website. Please contact creating-safer-space@aber.ac.uk with any questions.