The Fernando Gómez Martínez Library in Robledo Aures was the proud recipient of a 2012 Reina Sofía Award in Accessibility for its ‘Other Ways to Read and Write’ program, through which it offers disabled people access to books and teaches them a variety of ways to read and write, despite their limitations.

Not everyone is happy with the Government’s decision to lower airfare for flights between San Andrés and Providencia. Employees who operate a catamaran that travels five times a week to and from the islands are concerned that many people will now choose to fly, which will hurt business.

Others like Samia Fakih, the president of San Andres and Providencia’s Hotel Association, don’t think the catamaran service will be affected that significantly  but feel the challenge now is to increase the frequency of the flights offered.

Results of the measure will be evaluated after three months.

Samuel Azout, director of the National Agency for Overcoming Extreme Poverty (Anspe), is a man fortunate enough to have been born into a home in which he was given all the opportunities he ever needed, but he was also always aware of the fact that many others were not as lucky; he knew he eventually wanted to work to do something about it.

He created the ‘Soccer with a Heart’ program and a childhood development project in Carulla but eventually realized he may be able to do more at a governmental level.

“Some people are born into homes where they are given opportunities in education, health, recreation, values, but others are born into homes where they get stuck in a kind of vicious cycle,” he explained, “poverty and exclusion tend to expand over time and the way to break away from it is to give equal opportunities because everyone has different abilities (…) we must level out inequalities and democratize opportunities, which is what makes a respectable society.”

A heartbroken community gathered to support the family of an 11-year-old girl killed by a stray bullet on New Year’s Eve in Manrique. Relatives, friends and neighbors of Alisson Lizeth marched alongside her coffin expressing outrage over a practice that has claimed many lives in Colombia.

The priest presiding over the funeral ceremony expressed admiration for the little girl’s family, highlighting the fact that they have not expressed rage, vengeance or resentment. Alisson’s relatives wore white in her honor, saying she is now an angel watching over them and therefore it isn’t necessary to wear black.

For Ombudsman, Jorge Otálora, ‘it’s absurd that in many regions shooting a weapon into the air is still considered a form of celebration.” The Conflict Analysis Resource Center (Cerac) reported that in Colombia, between 2001 and 2011, 700 people died of injuries caused by stray bullets, aside from 1,970 other victims whose injuries were not fatal.