IRTF News

A Colombian conservationist who saved a rare species of parrot from extinction, a young feminist activist in Afghanistan, and two poets in Myanmar who used words to protest against the military coup were among 358 human rights defenders murdered in 35 countries last year. As in previous years, most killings took place in the Americas and in the Asia-Pacific region. Colombia, where activists are routinely targeted by armed groups despite the 2016 peace accord, remained the most dangerous country to be a human rights defender, with 138 deaths recorded. The majority of those killed, 59%, worked on land, environmental and indigenous rights, where their activities disrupted the economic interests of corporations and individuals in mining, logging and other extractive industries.

The former President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, or JOH, was arrested last week and will likely soon face charges by the U.S. Justice Department for allegedly trafficking roughly 500,000 kilos of cocaine. An Associated Press headline dubbed it a “stunning fall,” but the U.S. government provided him with significant support despite extensive evidence linking him to drug smuggling. Aside from his ties to narcotics, Hernandez was involved in several scandals, including embezzling funds from Honduras’ social security system, stealing from World Bank development programs, credible fraud allegations in his 2017 re-election, and pervasive human rights violations by the police and military. In private conversations, Hernandez bragged about siphoning U.S. aid via phony NGOs. American diplomats looked the other way as Honduras developed into a narco-state. Adding to this hypocrisy, the U.S. provided millions of dollars of aid for counternarcotics that trained/equipped a police and military bureaucracy riddled with corruption. In turn, Honduran security forces have acted viciously against peaceful protest. The reluctance to prosecute JOH had to do with international politics, not legal formalities.

The government, which was sworn in last month, also said that it would cancel environmental permits for mining operations across the country. For decades, indigenous groups have complained of legal and illegal mining in their ancestral lands. Honduras mines gold, silver, copper, lead and zinc but on Monday the Ministry of Mining described "extractive exploitation" as "harmful to the state of Honduras". It argued that mining threatened natural resources and public health as well as limiting access to water.

In a brief and somewhat surprising press release issued by the Ministry of Energy, Natural Resources, Environment and Mines (MiAmbiente), it was declared "the entire Honduran territory free of open-pit mining." It was a promise made by President Xiomara Castro, who during her inaugural speech promised: "No more permits for open mines or exploitation of our minerals, no more concessions in the exploitation of our rivers, hydrographic basins, our national parks and cloud forests." The brief document stated that the approval of extractivist exploitation permits is canceled because they are harmful to the State of Honduras, that they threaten natural resources, public health and that limit access to water as a human right.

Please see a summary of the letters we sent to heads of state and other high-level officials in Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras, urging their swift action in response to human rights abuses occurring in their countries.  We join with civil society groups in Latin America to: (1) protect people living under threat, (2) demand investigations into human rights crimes, (3) bring human rights criminals to justice. IRTF’s Rapid Response Network (RRN) volunteers write six letters in response to urgent human rights cases each month. We send copies of these letters to US ambassadors, embassy human rights officers, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, regional representatives of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and desk officers at the US State Department. To read the letters, see https://www.irtfcleveland.org/content/rrn , or ask us to mail you hard copies.

Prosecutors in El Salvador have charged the former president Alfredo Cristiani over the 1989 massacre of six Jesuit priests that sparked international outrage. Prosecutors also announced charges against a dozen other people, including former military officers, over the massacre. The list of charges will apparently include murder, terrorism and conspiracy. The attorney general, Rodolfo Delgado, wrote on his Twitter account that his office “is determined to go after those accused of ordering this regrettable and tragic event”.

The criminalization of human rights defenders, the destruction of water sources, contamination of their environment and the destruction of the community cemetery, is the terrible scenario experienced by the Maya-Chortí community of Azacualpa, La Unión, Copán and that was verified by the Minister of Human Rights, Natalie Roque Sandoval, after making an On-Site visit in the sector where the inhabitants live the constant violations of their fundamental freedoms by the mining company Aura Minerals-MINOSA.

Migrants from Haiti, Cuba, Venezuela, Cameroon, and other parts of Africa and Latin America are once again mobilizing in Tapachula to protest their treatment by Mexican immigration authorities. The latest demonstrations have been building for weeks, with the same grievances that have led to cycles of protests and multiple caravan attempts going back to 2020: The Mexican government refuses to let people leave Chiapas until their asylum claims have been processed by COMAR, and COMAR is backlogged with growing requests and thus months behind. “We are looking for a way to get out of Chiapas because in Chiapas there is no way to live because people are treating you like animals, your rights are being violated. So if we are refugees we are fighting so that we can get out and looking for a way to live so that we can eat.”