Environmental Human Rights: News & Updates

Since 2017, Amnesty International and the Inter-Church Commission for Peace and Justice have documented a string of attacks and threats against Jani Silva, president of the Association for the Integral Sustainable Development of the Amazonian Pearl (ADISPA), a community organization managing the Peasant Reserve Zone of La Perla Amazónica in the municipality of Puerto Asís, Putumayo Department.  State protection under the National Protection Unit (UNP) has proven insufficient to prevent at least seven different security incidents against her. Since January 2020, she has experienced persecution, illegal digital surveillance, death threats, shots fired into her home, and she uncovered a plan for her own assassination.

On September 10, Jani Silva received a phone call threatening her life, in which the caller described a truck that was provided to ADISPA by the UNP and explicitly stated plans to blow it up with her inside. Later that same day, unknown men with high-speed motorcycles were seen on two occasions prowling around Jani Silva’s house and ADISPA’s office in the town center of Puerto Asís.

Given that in 2023 more environmental defenders were killed in Colombia than in any other country in the world, we are deeply concerned for the safety of Jani Silva.

Honduras was recently ranked by Global Witness as the most dangerous place on the planet for environmental defenders, with the dubious distinction of more environmental defenders assassinated per capita than anywhere else on the planet.

In the community of Guapinol, it was clear that Juan Antonio López’s commitment to environmental stewardship was deeply rooted in his Catholic faith. He was actively involved in the church, serving as coordinator of Social Pastoral Care in the Diocese of Trujillo and co-founding the Integral Ecology Pastoral care in Honduras.

In August 2018, he and other residents of the community of El Guapinol in Tocoa, Colón Department, organized a peaceful encampment to block construction of an iron oxide mine inside the Carlos Escaleras Mejía National Park. The extraction project would threaten animal life and contaminate small rivers (water sources for 13 communities) that empty into the Río Aguán, placing 90,000 inhabitants at risk of losing their agricultural crops and homes. In late October 2018, police and 1500 heavily armed members of the Army, Cobras (militarized anti-riot police units) violently broke up the encampment with rifles, shields, clubs and tear gas bomb—beating and detaining the encampment residents. Juan López became one of 32 Guapinol residents criminalized for their protest. Eight of the defenders (the Guapinol 8) were unjustly imprisoned for 914 days.

Tragically, on September 14, 2024, Juan López (a 46-year-old husband and father) joined the list of martyrs in Guapinol who have been assassinated for their environmental defense, a list that includes: Levin Alexander Bonilla (October 27, 2018), Arnold Joaquin Morazán Erazo (Oct 13 2020), Aly Domínguez and Jairo Bonilla (January 7, 2023), and Oquelí Domínguez (June 15, 2023).

Local bishops, the bishops conference of Latin America, and even Pope Francis have publicly decried the assassination of Juan Antonio López and called for justice.

assassinated: young, gay defender of environmental and human rights Erlin Asbiel Blandin Alvarez

The killing of 34-year-old Erlin Asbiel Blandin Alvarez is a significant loss to the rural community of Los Laureles in Danlí, El Paraíso Department. It highlights the dangers faced by those who stand up for human rights in Honduras. His commitment to his community and his work as a journalism student highlight the importance of protecting those who strive for transparency and justice.

Erlin Asbiel Blandín Álvarez was home for the weekend from Tegucigalpa, where he was enrolled in his final year as a journalism student at the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH). Openly gay and well-respected by his neighbors, he was committed to advocating for essential community resources, including management of a water project and bringing awareness to the trafficking of migrants through El Paraíso. So deep was his commitment that he was serving as president of the community board of Los Laureles.

On Sunday morning July 14, when he went outside his home to work on a shed that he was building, assailants arrived on motorcycles and in an ATV.  Neighbors and family heard the gunshots and cries for help. They arrived only to see the assassins flee at high speed in their vehicles. Erlin Asbiel Blandín Álvarez died moments later, with gunshot wounds to his chest and shoulder.

Erlin Asbiel Blandin Alvarez, ¡presente!

Because of the violent history associated with large-scale mining operations in their communities, Tolupán Indigenous residents in Yoro Department are anxious and fearful because of renewed illegal mining in San Francisco de Locomapa. In recent years, many Tolupán defenders in Yoro have been harassed, threatened, criminalized and even killed. In January 2024, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) expanded protective measures to include a total of 97 members of the Tolupán community in San Francisco de Locomapa. This underscores the severe risks they face. 

The main culprit had been the US-owned Lachansa mining company, which in theory has now left the area. They have a reputation of creating  armed groups to generate violence and intimidate residents opposed to his company’s mining operations. It is deeply concerning that despite legal actions filed against the owners of Lachansa and the company’s supposed exit from the community, illegal mining operations are recurring.  The more recent illegal mining of antimony is  spearheaded by people who have been linked to previous unlawful mining activities. The mining is occurring without the free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC) of the Tolupán community, violating their fundamental rights and sovereignty over their ancestral lands. The devastating environmental impacts of open-pit mining are of great concern to the Tolupán communities.