Our first stop in Esmeraldas was UNHCR. This is where Colombian women displaced by violence turn to for help. Not everyone knows UNHCR exists. In fact, one of our interviews, Karen, had already spent a year and a half in Esmeraldas before discovering this safety net for asylum seekers. Karen is a single mother of two. Her daughter Daniela, a 14 year old girl, atrophied by cerebral palsy, lay in her arms limp and gargling with a slight grin that turned into a moan of discomfort as time passed.

UNHCR's Manuel Alcivar told us that Karen was representative of the women who pass through his office seeking refugee status. Violence in Colombia has amplified domestic violence to new levels of brutality within the home. Karen's partner locked her, chained her and beat her. As a mother, she perceived the psychological trauma such sightings of violence had on the only, silent witness: Daniela. She suspected her partner was paramilitary but was uncertain of his real identity.

"Paramilitary seduce women or take them by force," explained Alcivar. "Then, as heads of households, they force them to work. Then torture them, chain them and rape them.

Daniela's discomfort and the insecurity of her newborn, Marisa, gave Karen the courage to organize an escape. The owner of the house she lived in had a copy of the keys and helped her out of a lockdown situation. Bruised and beat-up, she took shelter in a church and then traveled on a clandestine speedboat to Esmeraldas with her daughters. For the last year, she has scraped a living from housework. Sex work, she said, was not possible given her daughter's condition but she reported recruitment efforts from a trafficking net when she was younger. A friend of hers, lured with promises of commercial success, died in the trade.
-- Dominique Soguel