Honduras did not experience civil war in the 1980s, but its geography (bordering El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua) made it a key location for US military operations: training Salvadoran soldiers, a base for Nicaraguan contras, military exercises for US troops. The notorious Honduran death squad Battalion 316 was created, funded and trained by the US. The state-sponsored terror resulted in the forced disappearances and extrajudicial killings of approximately 200 people during the 1980s. Many more were abducted and tortured. The 2009 military coup d’etat spawned a resurgence of state repression against the civilian population that continues today. IRTF signs on letter in solidarity with Berta’s family, the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) and Gustavo Castro (the Mexican activist who is the sole witness and survivor of the attack), the Committee for Human Rights in Latin America (CDHAL), the Honduras Solidarity Network and MiningWatch Canada have collaborated to put together a declaration for broad support.
On March 2nd, 2016 they assassinated our sister Berta Cáceres. They thought they would get rid not just of her as a leader recognized throughout Latin America and around the world, but also would end a struggle, a political project, that they would destroy the organization of which she was both founder and daughter, COPINH (the Civil Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras).
