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. Global Exchange and the Center for Democracy Studies (CESPAD) are organizing a joint national and international electoral observation mission in November 2025 for the Honduran general elections. Please consider applying and sharing with your listservs!!
to apply click here
Join us SUnday November 9 to mark 45 years since the martyrdom of four U.S. women in El Salvador and honor today’s fallen human rights defenders. Featuring Sebastián Torogóz, on tour with his book and music celebrating resistance, collective memory, and solidarity. Social hour (refreshments, music, raffle), commemoration service, speaker/music program, sit-down Central American dinner.
For tickets or sponshorship opportunities, click here.
To sign up to volunteer (either set-up on November 8 or during the event on November 9), click here: https://signup.com/go/dbvKrme
Do you and your neighbors and co-workers know what to do if visited, questioned, or arrested by ICE? Do you know you can call the Ohio Immigration Hotline 419-777-HELP (4357) ? There’s also the Ohio National Lawyers Guild Hotline: (614) 654-6477
You can stay up-to-date every day on ICE activities, trends in apprehensions and detentions by following Austin Kocher on Substack https://substack.com/@austinkocher/posts
In northeast Ohio, you can reach out to irtf@irtfcleveland.org for educational resources and trainings for your workplace, congregation, or community group.
Consider your position in your community. What can you contribute to undocumented community members or migrant organizations?
Do you know any legal, mental health, social work professionals?
What about school employees?
We need EVERYONE to consider how they can mobilize support for vulnerable migrant families.
If you yourself don’t hold a professional position that is needed, consider this: Could serve as a first-call, point person for someone who is detained? Reach out to them to initiate a supportive conversation. Are you positioned to do child pick-up and safeguarding? Well-connected with community orgs or professionally situated to help with legal, medical or other needs?
See the attached flyer for more resources and ways to get involved.
Karen Spring of the Honduras Solidarity Network exposes how Canadian and U.S.-backed tourism expansion has dispossessed Indigenous Garifuna communities along Honduras’ north coast. During 13 years of U.S. and Canadian support for corrupt, militarized “Narco Regimes,” tourism investors — many Canadian and American — illegally acquired Garifuna lands in Trujillo Bay. Now, as Garifuna communities reclaim their ancestral territories, Canadian investors and companies like NJOI are leading racist defamation campaigns against Garifuna leaders and OFRANEH, falsely portraying themselves as victims. The conflict highlights the ongoing colonial exploitation of Indigenous lands under the guise of “development” and tourism.
A vehicle blocked their car, and its passengers stepped out with their weapons, trying to attack the group. They managed to escape, but the incident was not the first – nor would it be the last time Bertha Zúñiga would face a violent threat.
That encounter came just over a year after Zúñiga’s mother, Berta Cáceres, a prominent Lenca Indigenous rights activist in Honduras, was killed in her home in March 2016, leading to Zúñiga taking the leadership of her group, the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH).
Zúñiga was a toddler when her mother started the group to defend indigenous Lenca land from commercial interests that local communities say harm and exploit it.
Bertha Zúñiga continues the fight that her mother began against powerful corporate and political interests. Facing death threats, smear campaigns, and even state security leaks, Zúñiga leads COPINH in defending Lenca land and water from destructive projects—undaunted by the risks that cost her mother’s life.
The United Nations has documented a crisis of press freedom in Honduras, noting systematic attacks on journalists as a means of obstructing accountability and weakening democracy. The case of Jorge Posadas is emblematic of this broader crisis for journalists who continue their vital work under threat.
Based in Santa Rosa de Copán, Copán Department, Jorge Posadas has been reporting on corruption allegations and environmental destruction linked to Aníbal Erazo Alvarado, mayor of Santa Rosa de Copán. In recent weeks, he has been victim to escalating threats, surveillance, and harassment. He has reported being followed by unidentified vehicles observed near his home and workplace. In a news article published on September 1, Jorge Posadas stated: “I am very worried about my life and that of my family because strange vehicles are following us.”
We remind authorities in Honduras of their obligation to address the entrenched impunity surrounding attacks on journalists.
Violent land conflicts have persisted in the Bajo Aguán Valley in the coastal department of Colón for the past 50 years. In the 1970s, many campesinos benefited from the government’s agrarian reform. But in their zeal to expand monoculture plantations for cash crops, large agro-industrial companies like Dinant have encroached on campesino farm land. When campesino organizations began “recuperating” (recovering) their rightful lands, the companies retaliated with violence, often with the assistance of state security forces and sometimes the backing of the courts (that issue illegal eviction notices).
In 2022, President Castro signed an agreement to establish a commission to investigate and resolve land conflicts in the Bajo Aguán. That has not been fully implemented. In the meantime, campesinos are shot and killed while driving to work or working their fields.
We call to mind the many campesinos killed this year, including:
JAN 2: Arnulfo Díaz (member of Cooperativa Brisas del Aguán), forced off the road and shot by armed actors at the Río San Pedro
FEB 2: José Luis Hernández Lobo and Suyapa Guillén (active members of the Empresa Campesina Gregorio Chávez), shot when their vehicle was intercepted by armed actors in Rigores
MAY 31: Josué Esaú Aguilar Cárcamo, 22-year-old son of Guadalupe Cárcamo (active member of Empresa Campesina Gregorio Chávez), shot in Rigores while riding his motorcycle home from school
JUL 17: Carlos Antonio Rivas Canales (member of Empresa Campesina Gregorio Chávez) and his father Ramón Rivas Baquedano (member of Empresa Asociativa Campesina de Producción La Aurora), ambushed by heavily armed men while on their way to work
JUL 26: Héctor Otoniel Hernández Castro (member of Empresa Campesina Gregorio Chávez and brother of Wendy Castro, the sub-coordinator of Plataforma Agraria), shot armed men while working in the fields in Cuyamel, Trujillo.
AUG 1: Abel Monroy (father-in-law of an active member of Cooperativa El Chile who had previously been threatened), shot while driving to work in Bonito Oriental
We urge the government to take immediate action to prevent further unnecessary deaths.
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.
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.
