Rapid Response Network

Indigenous communities in the southern border state of Chiapas have long been victim to political violence, paramilitary violence, extractivist dispossession, territorial and religious conflicts, and organized criminal activity.

FRAYBA (Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center) has a well-respected reputation for defending their human rights. But as FRAYBA conducts its legitimate work of denouncing the systematic rights violations against communities (and accompanying them in their search for justice), its members are subject to repeated attacks and accusations. The context of harassment, intimidation, threats, and systematic surveillance of FRAYBA members has escalated.

In late July, the newly-appointed director of FRAYBA, Dora Robledo, suffered a raid on her private home. This was the second such incident in the past ten months.

We are urging that federal authorities and those in Chiapas ensure that the protection measures issued on behalf of FRAYBA by the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights be enforced.

Five members of the Indigenous Garifuna communities of Trujillo and Sante Fe are being prosecuted for defending their ancestral lands; their names are Cesia Guillén, Cindy Fernández, Gilma Bernárdez, Luis Calderón, and Cesar Geovanny Bernárdez. All of the defendants are members of the Honduran Black Fraternal Organization (OFRANEH), an organization that has been helping the Garifuna in their fight to defend collective property. 

The defendants have been unjustly accused of forced displacement and aggravated usurpation by Dagoberto Castillo Castillo and Niobi Constantinidi Padilla. Castillo claims to be a bona fide purchaser of a property in the San Antonio area of Santa Fe Colón, despite the fact that the Garifuna people hold its property title dating back to 1882. Their fight is supported by a report from the National Agrarian Institute (INA), indicating that the land is located within Garifuna ancestral territory and that its sale is void.

This state-backed legal attack is part of a systematic act of dispossession against Garifuna communities. Central to its execution has been the repression of land defense movements through deliberate criminalization and persecution of those leading the defense of their ancestral homes. 

The courthouse in Trujillo, which is now effectively dedicated to the persecution of the Garífuna people, was built on Garifuna territory. The initial hearing for the five defendants was held there on August 11.

One of the significant outcomes of the Peace Accords in 2016 was the installation of the JEP (Special Jurisdiction for Peace), which is a justice component of the Comprehensive System of Truth, Justice, Reparation and Non-Repetition (SIVJRNR). The JEP functions to investigate, prosecute, and punish the most serious crimes related to the armed conflict that occurred before December 1, 2016, seeking to prioritize victims, clarify the truth, and repair the damage. One of the key partners in the work of the JEP is the civil society organization CSPP (Committee in Solidarity with Political Prisoners).

Active in the Atlántico Department chapter of CSPP is 27-year-old Nilson de Arco. Last month, as he was meeting in a public space with three other human rights defenders to make a recording, a man on a motorcycle approached them. He got down from his motorcycle and shot Nilson de Arco directly. Nilson was rushed to the hospital and given specialized medical attention.

The assassination attempt on Nilson de Arco must be considered in the context of the increasing number of threats, harassment, and violence perpetrated against human rights defenders in Colombia.  We urge the government to take the necessary measures to ensure that human rights defenders, community leaders, and civil society organizations can carry out their work without fear of reprisals.

There are hundreds of self-governed Indigenous territorial reserves (“resguardos”) throughout Colombia. They have their own community councils and Indigenous Guards. Because the work of the Indigenous Guard involves direct confrontation with armed groups, prominent members are often labeled “military targets.”

Estiben Torres was recently elected to head the Indigenous Guard for the Honduras Reservation (aka U’h Wala Vxiç) in Morales, Cauca Department. At 9pm on June 25, Estiben Torres was leaving a community meeting at the “tulpa” sacred gathering space in the hamlet of Maco, traveling on a motorcycle. He was intercepted by armed men who signaled for him to stop. When he did not obey their request, they chased him and, upon reaching the urban area of ​​Morales, they opened fire, wounding him in one of his lower extremities.

It is unclear to us whether the National Protection Unit (UNP) has allocated security detail specifically to Estiben Torres. According to CRIC (Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca), “the existing measures implemented by the UNP are inefficient and inadequate for the level of risk.” 

We are urging that authorities consult with leaders of CRIC to strengthen security measures for the Indigenous communities of Cauca and their Indigenous Guards.

Despite the historic peace agreement between the Colombia government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in November 2016, the armed conflict continues in various regions of the country. Since January 16 of this year, the National Liberation Army (ELN) has been carrying out a campaign to regain control of large parts of the trans-border Catatumbo River region (Colombia-Venezuela), a strategic location for drug production and trafficking in North Santander Department. They have killed, assaulted, kidnapped, and disappeared civilians whom they accuse of having ties with the 33rd Front, a dissident faction of the demobilized FARC. Fighting and abuses by both sides have reportedly forced over 56,000 people to flee their homes, one of the largest mass displacements in Colombia in decades.

Meanwhile, humanitarian organizations are facing threats. Catatumbo Mothers for Peace (MCP), for example, provides shelter and psychosocial support to displaced women. On June 25, MCP denounced  a series of defamatory content published on a digital platform, which included direct threats to Carmen García, president of the association.  Less than two weeks later, two individuals on motorcycles grabbed her son in front of the group’s women’s shelter in Cúcuta, beat him, and dragged him along the asphalt, causing severe physical and psychological injuries.

We are urging that authorities in Colombia coordinate a protection scheme for Carmen García and her family and implement a comprehensive plan to ensure that all human rights defenders in Catatumbo are able to operate without threats and abuse.

The people of Honduras continue to pursue justice for the militarized repression that occurred during and following the coup d’etát on June 28, 2009.

Thousands gathered to protest near the Toncontín airport in Tegucigalpa on July 5, 2009 and were met with militarized violence. Isy Obed Murillo, age 18, became the first martyr of the coup era when he was shot in the head by army snipers. Honduran soldiers also seriously injured another young man, Alex Zavala.

Finally on January 5, 2025, former military general Romeo Vásquez Velásquez (a graduate of the infamous School of the Americas) was arrested, along with two other former military officers: Venancio Cervantes (former Deputy Chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and Carlos Puerto (former commander of the Joint Operations Command).  Romeo Vásquez Velásquez has been a fugitive since March 19, after failing to appear at his court hearing. The other two voluntarily presented themselves and are currently being held in a federal penitentiary. Romeo Vásquez Velásquez, meanwhile, evades accountability and flaunts his fugitive status as he remains active on social media and even issues messages to government officials.

We join with human rights organizations in Honduras in calling for a comprehensive search for (and detention of) fugitive Romeo Vásquez Velásquez.

Indigenous communities continue to bear the brunt of the ongoing armed conflict in Colombia. Even if leaders are not blatantly political in their work, they are still targeted.

William Ferney Pazú Toconás, age 23, was a renowned Indigenous cultural leader from Vitoyó village in the Jambaló Reservation in the north of Cauca Department. A member of the musical group Los Tiraflechas, he was passionate about playing flute and drum music and was respected for his work teaching traditional Indigenous music and instruments to children and young adults.

The morning after a cultural celebration, his body was found on the banks of a river in the center of the reservation. He became the 21st social leader killed in Cauca Department this year, and the 85th overall in Colombia.

William Ferney Pazú Toconás, ¡presente!

The National Civil Police (PNC) and members of the Armed Forces are harassing and scaring those who publicly call for the release of jailed environmental defenders José Ángel Pérez and Alejandro Henríquez, who were arrested in May after participating in a vigil protesting the eviction of 300 families from the El Bosque agricultural cooperative.  Security forces visit people’s homes, follow them in vehicles, take photographs, and interrogate people. One of the questions they ask is whether these spokespersons for these organizations motivate them to protest against the government. "What's being set up is a witch hunt," said Carlos Flores, spokesperson for the Water Forum, as he denounced the government-led effort to dismantle civil society organizations and criminalize peaceful protest.

In July, Amnesty International declared some of these falsely criminalized environmental and human rights defenders as prisoners of conscience, including José Ángel Pérez, Alejandro Henríquez, and prominent human rights and anti-corruption attorney for the human rights organization Cristosal, Ruth López.

We call on the government of El Salvador to end the systematic persecution and incarceration of advocates for the environment, civil and human rights.

The ERC Capital group, owner of the Raaxhá Hydroelectric dam in Alta Verapaz, promotes the electric generation project as “clean sustainable energy.” The name “raaxhá” means “green water” in the local Maya Q’eqchi’ dialect.

But local Indigenous communities north of Cobán saw the threats to their water supply and rallied to stop its construction. In January 2020, the government of former President Jimmy Morales (whose 2016-20 administration was riddled with corruption) approved a permit for the project. The attorney general began a legal process against the director of MARN (Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources) for the illegal approval. Both the National Council of Protected Areas (CONAP) and the National Institute of Forests (INAB) noted negative findings in the environmental impact study. Both institutions—responsible for managing the Laguna de Lachuá National Park—foresaw the probable harms of water diversion.  

Indeed, since Raaxhá began their operations on the Icbolay River, there has been evident depletion of the river’s water supply with the operation of its hydroelectric dam, contaminating what remains of the water and negatively affecting individuals’ health and the environment. MARN’s complicity in the draining and denial of accessible water for local inhabitants is reflective of a larger pattern of prioritizing the economic development of corporations over the will and well-being of Guatemalans.  

Speaking up to denounce the irreversible damage to land and waterways caused by large scale mining operations is dangerous. There were more than 60 registered assassinations of environmental defenders in Guatemala between 2014 and 2024; the majority were in Izabal and Alta Verapaz Departments.

Marco Antonio Zuleta Quevedo worked as a ranger and forest firefighter to protect the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve, the largest cloud forest habitat in Central America. He received death threats for reporting illegal resource extraction. On May 9, he was shot and killed while walking home in Usumatlán, Zacapa Department.

Misael Mata Ascencio was active in the anti-mining resistance formed by 54 communities in the Sierra Santa Cruz region of Izabal Department, where Río Nickel S.A. (a subsidiary of Canada-based Central America Nickel, or CAN) had filed more than a dozen mining exploration applications for nickel and other minerals. While working as a security guard on a farm in his community, he was beaten and shot to death on May 14.

In addition to urging authorities to continue the investigations, we ask that the government invest more time and resources to consult with Indigenous communities about their legitimate concerns regarding mining operations.