On July 23, more than 1,250 indigenous women and community leaders caravanned to the Nasa community of Toribío, Southwestern Colombia, to show solidarity with their "family" caught in the middle of the country s civil war since mid-April. Organized by the Women s Coordinating Committee of the Indigenous Regional Council of Cauca, which was awarded the Millennium Peace Prize for Women in 2001, the caravan mainly consisted of Nasa women and afro-Colombians, but also had participants of Wayúu, Kankuama, U&nbps;wa, Uitota, Tikuna and Pijao descent. Four-hundred members of the "armed" Nasa Guard accompanied the women on the trip. The Guard, only armed with colorful sticks, was awarded the National Peace Prize in 2004.
The Nasa, also known as the Paez, are the second largest indigenous group in Colombia, accounting for 300,000 of Colombia's one million indigenous peoples. According to IPS News Agency, they demand that their right to remain neutral in the war be recognized and that the paramilitary, the military, and the leftist guerillas leave their territory.
