US EditionColombian Environmental Activist Honored Amid Threats and Exile
She helped halt fracking pilot projects and organized residents after oil spills displaced hundreds and killed thousands of animals, officials said.
- On Monday, Afro-Colombian activist Yuvelis Morales Blanco won the Goldman Environmental Prize, often called the "Green Nobel," for her role in halting fracking in Colombia.
- Morales Blanco co-founded the organization Aguawil around 2019 to protect her hometown, Puerto Wilches, from fracking pilot projects proposed in the Magdalena River region.
- Colombia is the deadliest country for environmental defenders, with nearly 150 murdered in 2024 alone according to Global Witness; Morales Blanco faced death threats and sought asylum in France.
- President Gustavo Petro imposed a nationwide fracking moratorium, though efforts to codify a permanent ban have stalled in Congress as Colombia hosts a global fossil fuel summit in Santa Marta this week.
- Despite the risks, Morales Blanco insists her opposition to projects threatening the Magdalena is "non-negotiable," describing the moment as "the beginning of the end" of fossil fuel expansion in Colombia.
29 Articles
29 Articles
ABC FOX Montana
Colombian environmental activist honored amid threats and exile
Afro-Colombian woman Yuvelis Morales, a 25-year-old who has spent most of her adult life working to block the world's biggest oil companies from exploiting fragile ecosystems, won the environmental equivalent of a Nobel prize on Monday.
Inside Climate News
ecotopical.comRights of Nature Defender Wins Goldman Prize for Protecting Colombia’s Magdalena River From Fracking
Yuvelis Morales Blanco, 24, helped halt fracking along Colombia’s largest river and one of the most biodiverse places on Earth. She’s faced death threats and exile for her advocacy.By Katie SurmaAs a child growing up along the banks of Colombia’s Magdalena River, Yuvelis Morales Blanco learned to read the water.
Yuvelis Morales Blanco was a university student when the Colombian government announced two projects of fracking in Puerto Wilches, department of Santander. The young woman, who lived closely the environmental pollution of the hydrocarbon industry, left her studies to help mobilize the community and, in 2022, managed to stop the introduction of this technique of [...]
For 18 years he has been leading the opposition to this controversial extraction technique in his municipality, Puerto Wilches, Santander
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