More than one hundred national, international, and solidarity organizations, with a presence in Canada, Europe, the United States, Mexico, Central America, and South America, signed an open letter addressed to the Attorney General's Office of the Republic of El Salvador to demand the immediate release of environmental lawyer Alejandro Henríquez and community leader Ángel Pérez, president of the El Bosque Agricultural Cooperative, who were arbitrarily detained on May 12 and 13, 2025.
In the letter, the organizations condemn the use of security forces to repress the families of the El Bosque community, who were exercising their legitimate right to peaceful protest due to a planned eviction, when they were dispersed by riot police, resulting in the arrest of Ángel Pérez and, subsequently, of lawyer Alejandro Henríquez, who was providing legal advice to the affected families.
As immigration detention capacity in Ohio has jumped from 120 to 1,500 in recent weeks, IRTF (InterReligious Task Force on Central America) hopes to increase the visibility of faith leaders and communities showing our collective support for vulnerable migrant* families.
To that end, we hope you can take 3 minutes to read the attached letter and offer your endorsement by May 27, 2025 to brian@irtfcleveland.org .
Appendices to the letter include statements on the rights of migrants (and biblical mandate to “welcome the stranger”) from Jewish, Muslim and Christian religious bodies. There is also a statement from Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb and a national interfaith coalition.
What will we do with the sign-on letter?
-make it public at a prayer vigil/press conference in mid-June (date/location to be determined)
-use it as a basis to build interfaith solidarity in defense of migrants over the next several months or more)
Please contact brian@irtfcleveland.org if you as a faith leader endorse the letter. If you endorse, please list your name with your title, congregation/organization, and city. Info: 216 961 0003
Marco Rubio, Matt Gaetz and Donald Trump Jr. have made pilgrimage to El Salvador, and Republican commentator Tucker Carlson said Bukele “may have the blueprint for saving the world.”
The Garífuna, an Afro-Indigenous people with a profound historical and cultural presence in Honduras, continue to be targeted for defending their rights to territory, culture, and life. Despite legal victories, the Honduran government has failed to implement structural reforms or offer protection for these communities.
On April 10, the Garífuna community, which lives primarily along the Atlantic coast, led mobilization in the nation’s capial, Tegucigalpa. They demanded that the Honduran government comply with binding rulings issued by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (2015, 2023) in favor of three Garífuna communities in Colón (Punta Piedra) and Atlántida (Triunfo de la Cruz, San Juan).
Barely two days later, in the early morning hours of April 12, Max Gil Castillo Mejía, brother of the president of the community council of Punta Piedra was kidnapped from his home in San Pedro Sula (Cortés Department) by armed individuals who identified themselves as police officers. Just two days later, prominent Garífuna leader Miriam Miranda and other members of the Garífuna community of El Triunfo de la Cruz received threats.
Silencing Indigenous and Afro-descendant voices through fear and violence is a violation not only of human dignity but of binding international commitments. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has already warned that this violence will persist as long as the Honduran State refuses to uphold international legal mandates. IRTF calls on the government of Honduras to implement the rulings of the Inter-American Court to ensure that justice, reparations, and peace are no longer deferred for the Garífuna people.
Read IRTF’s recent letter demanding justice for Max Castillo here. To add your name to these urgent human rights letters, see https://www.irtfcleveland.org/content/RRN/join-RRN .
Members of the Parliament of the Indigenous Xinka People (PAPXIGUA) gave a press conference on May 8, 2025 in front of the Government Palace in Guatemala City after delivering the results of the community consultation ordered by the Constitutional Court in 2018. The consultation process lasted 7 years, but the resistance against the El Escobal mine, that was arbitrarily installed in the territory, has been ongoing for more than 15 years—with intense moments of repression, including states of siege, attacks and assassinations of their members. Throughout the struggle, the state and corrupt local and international forces have intervened in the consultation process, worked to delay it, spread misinformation, and attempted to modify the results.
This mine has passed through several companies, finally remaining in the hands of the Canadian mining company Pan American Silver, which has yet to respond to the refusal of mining extraction by the Xinka people of Santa Rosa, Jalapa and Jutiapa. The Ministry of Energy and Mines (MEM), the state body in charge of this process, must respond to the will of the Xinka people.
Despite community opposition since 2010, the Ministry of Energy and Mines granted the exploitation license in 2013. Communities organized demonstrations in protest. On May 1, 2013, President Otto Pérez Molina declared a State of Siege, deployed 8,000 soldiers and police, suspended constitutional guarantees, and made numerous arrests. Police and protesters were killed during the State of Seige.
Resistance continued on the streets and in the courts. Judges issued injunctions to suspend mining operations; other judges undid those injunctions. Finally, the highest court of Guatemala (Constitutional Court) ruled on September 3, 2018 that the government must conduct a proper, thorough and transparent consultation with the Xinka people. After stalling by the Ministry of Energy of Mines and the Ministry of the Interior, the consultation was conducted 2019-2025, and the Xinka people have now formally announced their decision. No to silver mining !
With the persistence that characterizes the Indigenous Peoples of Guatemala, the Xinka people said NO! In their statement, PAPXIGUA said: “We deny our consent to the Escobal mining project.” We are now awaiting the response from the corresponding entities, as well as actions and calls for solidarity from the Xinka people. #TheRightToConsentIsRespected
The National Commission of Human Rights in Honduras recently reported that more than 60 human rights defenders, including environmental defenders, were killed under violent circumstances during 2020-2025. The majority of those crimes remain in impunity.
We wrote to the National Commissioner to express our dismay over the lack of justice in the case of environmental defender Juan Antonio López, who was assassinated while walking home from church on September 14, 2024 (cf our letter of 21 SEP 2024). Local bishops, the bishops conference of Latin America, and even the late Pope Francis publicly decried his assassination and called for justice.
As a leading member of the Guapinol Environmental Defense Committee (in Tocoa, Colón Department), Juan López worked tirelessly to protect the Guapinol and San Pedro Rivers from the destructive impacts of the Los Pinares/Ecotek mining project in the Montaña de Botaderos “Carlos Escaleras” National Park. Despite a 2024 presidential decree (Decree 18/2024) designating the park as a protected zone, reports persist that the mining company continues to operate illegally in restricted areas, protected by armed groups and with impunity.
Since 2012, Honduras has recorded at least 149 murders of environmental activists, with one of the highest per capita rates in the world. The similarities between the López case and that of murdered Indigenous Lenca environmental defender Berta Cáceres (March 2, 2016) are striking and deeply troubling: obstruction of justice, denial of state responsibility, and failure to dismantle the networks of corruption and violence that enable these crimes.
Read IRTF’s recent letter demanding justice for Juan López here. To add your name to these urgent human rights letters, see https://www.irtfcleveland.org/content/RRN/join-RRN .
In a press release on the rights of transgender persons issued March 31, 2024, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) reminded the member nations of the Organization of American States (OAS) that recognition of gender identity is essential to all civil, political and human rights. The IACHR expressed its disposition to work with member nations and civil society to promote and guarantee the human rights of persons who are trans, non-binary, or otherwise of the sexual diversity community.
In Colombia, trans people were given the right to change their gender on all identification documents starting in 2015. In October 2019, Bogotá elected their first woman and lesbian mayor. Various elected representatives across national, departmental, and local levels now come from the LGBTI+ community. Increased visibility in TV shows and media coverage has grown more consistent.
Despite the advances, hatred and violence against LGBTI+ persons (especially transgender persons) persists. In 2024, the Office of the Human Rights Ombudsman reported a 30% increase (compared to the previous year) in cases of bias-based violence against transgender women, transgender men, and non-binary people. And so far this year, at least 24 LGBTI+ have been killed.
Three of those hate killings have happened in just one town, Bello, a suburb of Medellin. In a horrific act of violence on April 4, assailants abducted Sara Millerey González, a 32-year-old trans activist, beat her, broke her arms and legs and threw her into the Playa Rica River and left her to die. The incident gained national attention because onlookers recorded her screaming from the water and posted videos on social media. When rescuers finally retrieved her and took her to an emergency clinic, she was suffering from a punctured lung and hypothermia. She died from a heart attack the following day, with her mother at her bedside. “I knelt down and hugged her and told her that I loved her very much. I told her she was going to be with God, because no one in heaven was going to humiliate or discriminate against her for being her.”
The National Commission of Human Rights in Honduras recently reported that more than 60 human rights defenders, including environmental defenders, were killed under violent circumstances during 2020-2025. The majority of those crimes remain in impunity.
We wrote to the National Commissioner to express our dismay over the lack of justice in the case of environmental defender Juan Antonio López, who was assassinated while walking home from church on September 14, 2024 (cf our letter of 21 SEP 2024). Local bishops, the bishops conference of Latin America, and even the late Pope Francis publicly decried his assassination and called for justice.
As a leading member of the Guapinol Environmental Defense Committee (in Tocoa, Colón Department), Juan López worked tirelessly to protect the Guapinol and San Pedro Rivers from the destructive impacts of the Los Pinares/Ecotek mining project in the Montaña de Botaderos “Carlos Escaleras” National Park. Despite a 2024 presidential decree (Decree 18/2024) designating the park as a protected zone, reports persist that the mining company continues to operate illegally in restricted areas, protected by armed groups and with impunity.
Since 2012, Honduras has recorded at least 149 murders of environmental activists, with one of the highest per capita rates in the world. The similarities between the López case and that of murdered Indigenous Lenca environmental defender Berta Cáceres (March 2, 2016) are striking and deeply troubling: obstruction of justice, denial of state responsibility, and failure to dismantle the networks of corruption and violence that enable these crimes.
During the fall of 2023, civil society groups across Guatemala held mobilizations to ensure the peaceful transition to power of then President-elect Bernardo Arévalo while also demanding the resignation of Attorney General María Consuelo Porras, who sought to block his inauguration. In Totonicapán Department, an association of 48 Indigenous K'iche' communities led peaceful protests that shut down highways across Guatemala for three weeks.
On April 23 of this year, police arrested two of the former leaders of 48 Cantones of Totonicapán. Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán have been remanded to pretrial detention in the military prison Mariscal Zavala on allegations of terrorism because of the protests.
The arrests of Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán have prompted widespread condemnation. President Arévalo stated that the arrests were unfounded and “criminalized principles and rights that are guaranteed.” The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights referred to the arrests as “a continued spurious instrumentalization of the constitutional function of investigating crimes.” To show their solidarity with Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán, the Committee for Campesino Development (CODECA) blockaded 18 simultaneous locations on April 28. On May 2, members of 48 Cantones de Totonicapán held a press conference at the Plaza of the Constitution in the nation’s capital demanding their release.
Attorney General María Consuelo Porras has been accused of criminalizing the constitutional rights to freedom of expression and assembly. She has been sanctioned for corruption by the US and over 40 other countries, all while using her position to persecute those who have fought against corruption.
We are urging that authorities in Guatemala 1) drop all charges against Luis Pacheco and Héctor Chaclán and release them to their families; 2) investigate Attorney General María Consuelo Porras for violating the rights of Indigenous peoples and impeding corruption investigations; and 3) end the misuse of the judicial process against human rights defenders, Indigenous leaders, and others who have fought against corruption.
