At least 1,300 LGBT people have been murdered in the last 10 years in Colombia. Behind these figures are stories of people who shared our tastes, professions and dreams; stories that are told in Celeste, a new online platform that seeks to dignify the memory of LGBT people who have been murdered in the country. This tool can be consulted at: https://www.colombiadiversa.org/celeste/

A young student who took his own life because of prejudice against LGBT people, the first murder of a trans woman recognised as a femicide in Colombia, an engineer murdered in his home, as well as cases that happened in the context of the armed conflict, are some of the stories that can be found in Celeste, the new virtual platform that seeks to dignify the memory of LGBT people murdered in Colombia and that will be launched on 17 February through a sensory tour at the Antípoda cultural centre.

Behind the initiative is the work of a research team from Colombia Diversa, which set itself the task of documenting the murders of LGBT people in the country since 2005, in the absence of official data produced by the state. For years, this work took the form of an annual human rights report that recounted how many LGBT people were killed. But the stories of pain behind each report made it clear that there is a historical debt in which LGBT people, their lives and their stories have been erased, and their deaths justified through prejudice and stereotypes. This is why Celeste was born, to give a face to some of the 1,300 victims of homicide in Colombia in recent years.

"The idea behind Celeste is that people who visit the site know that the many headlines about LGBT people being killed hide life stories, families who lost their children, students who lost their teachers, colleagues who lost their colleagues, and communities who lost their leaders," says Gustavo Pérez, human rights coordinator at Colombia Diversa and one of the people behind Celeste.

These stories are found in "a digital universe" divided into three constellations or levels: the first level contains detailed profiles of 20 LGBT people, which were built from a rigorous investigation, with audios from their relatives or even from the victims themselves before they were killed; the second level contains 50 stories, built from the information in the Colombia Diversa database; and the third level has a text in homage to 1,300 LGBT people who were killed and for whom there is not enough information. Access Celeste - web platform made together with the Partnerships for Reconciliation Program (PAR) of the United States Agency for International Development USAID and ACDI/VOCA - is very easy, you only have to enter the website www.colombiadiversa.org/celeste empathy will be the guide on this website, a questionnaire will direct users to match stories of people similar to themselves. It will be a virtual tour designed to understand that we all share the same sky.

All these stories, regardless of differences in region, identity or age, have one thing in common: they show that discrimination in the country, both outside and within the armed conflict, has been at the root of the murders of many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Colombia. A scourge that will only change with the empathy of those who manage to see these people as equals. Celeste seeks to be a response to this.