Questions asked by Ole von Uexkull on September 22, 2006.
(Free to use, no copyright)

Q: How did you conceive the idea of the Poetry Festival?

A: In circumstances of terror during the war between drug-traffickers and the Colombian state which ruled over Medellín in 1991. We clearly had two options: to flee or to face the situation. I proposed to some of my fellow poets the foundation of the International Poetry Festival of Medellín at the end of 1990. In this way we opposed beauty to terror, and we confronted poetry and death.

Q: What has made it such a success?

A: Poetry has a growing prestige in the world because it embodies the fundamental interests of people, their dignity, their aspirations to freedom, social justice and a harmonious peace. In an authoritarian and intolerant country such as Colombia, where free thought is penalized and we have no real freedom of expression or of assembly, the poets of the world have been the bearers of the poetic traditions, voices and thoughts of almost all the geographical regions of the earth. The spirit of dialogue of poetry has nurtured the spiritual resistance of the Colombian people against the adversity of an unjust state, and has opened new horizons for our menaced youth.

Q: There are different armed groups in Colombia who have often sabotaged attempts to build peace. Why have they never attacked the Festival?

A: The International Poetry Festival of Medellín has been respected by almost all the armed groups in the country. However, in 2003 paramilitary groups threatened the Prometeo group that annually summons and organises the Festival. We had notice of this threat through a telephone call from Hollman Lozano, an employee in the Peace Advisory Office of the Presidency, during the first World Summit for Peace in Colombia, organised by our work group. The paramilitary commander "Doble cero" ("Double Zero") said to Lozano literally: "We're going to fill their bodies with lead".

Q: Has the Festival been threatened in other ways, too?

A: The Festival has been threatened and put under pressure in many ways, but especially it has suffered economic repression by the State and former mayors of the city of Medellín, the present one, Sergio Fajardo, being the sole exception. The Colombian media have deliberately ignored the Festival on many occasions. Some of the newspapers, such as "El Mundo" of Medellín, have even demanded that the Mayor's Office of Medellín stop its financial assistance, because of our unbreakable political independence.

 
Q: Does Medellín become more peaceful during the Festival?

A: During decades, the Colombian people have proven their unswerving inclination toward life and peace with social justice. Naturally, the atmosphere of the city is deeply transformed during the months previous and after the Festival. However, the condition of social, cultural and spiritual decomposition caused by the actual corrupt Colombian political system and lack of a larger budget to project in a much wider scale our poetic proposal to the world have prevented us from developing our objectives even further.

Q: What makes poetry so attractive to so many people in Colombia?

A: Our people permanently desire peace, beauty, truth and justice, which constitute the natural yearning of all peoples on earth. Because of this, poetry, which legitimately represents this yearning, is appreciated in Medellín as life itself.