Category: The scale and nature of present day violence

Lenca Indigenous Journalist Pablo Hernández Is Gunned Down

Chapter 9 / Chapter 8 / The Lenca people of Honduras / Troublesome Journalists

It would have been too much to expect that the election of a new president, Xiomara Castro, would signal a reduction in violence and killings in Honduras, although it remains a hope. Three weeks before the inauguration of the new president, Lenca Indigenous journalist Pablo Hernández was assassinated. We reproduce here the initial report of the crime by TeleSur.

Published 10 January 2022, TeleSur

Journalist Pablo Hernández, Honduras.  Photo: Twitter/@Orlinmahn

Keywords: Pablo Hernández; Honduras; Indigenous peoples; Bertha Oliva; Juan Carlos Cerros; AMCH; political assassination; COFADEH.

For years now, Honduras has become one of the most dangerous places for human rights defenders, environmental activists, journalists, and social leaders.

On Sunday, Honduran human rights defender Pablo Hernández was murdered by several bullet shots in the back in the Tierra Colorada community, in the Lempira department.

Bertha Oliva, the coordinator of the Committee of Relatives of the Disappeared in Honduras (COFADEH), denounced that armed men ambushed Hernández on a dirt road.

“This murder is one more attack on freedom of expression and the defence of human rights,” The Association of Community Media in Honduras (AMCH) said, recalling that Hernández was director of the Tenan community radio station that broadcasts from San Marcos de Caiquín.

“Hernández was the second Lenca leader killed in less than a year. In March 2020, Lenca activist Juan Carlos Cerros was shot to death in the town of Nueva Granada,” news agency AP recalled, adding that they “belonged to the same indigenous community as Berta Cáceres, a prize-winning environmental and Indigenous rights defender who was murdered in 2016.”

The AMCH denounced that Hernández was threatened and harassed on several occasions for defending the rights of Indigenous peoples, for which he filed a complaint with the authorities.

Besides having been a promoter of the Indigenous University, Hernández was mayor of the Auxiliaría de La Vara Alta, coordinator of ecclesial base communities, and president of the Cacique Lempira Biosphere Agro-Ecologists Network.

The assassination of the Indigenous journalist was also condemned by former President Manuel Zelaya, whose wife, Xiomara Castro, will be inaugurated as president of Honduras January 27.

Journalist shot dead in Honduras: 4th journalist killed this year

Chapter 9 / Troublesome Journalists

Journalism has been and remains a perilous occupation in Central America for many years and particularly for Hondurans since the 2009 coup d’état. The passage into government earlier this year of a popular government that was elected without fraud has not yet removed the threat to journalists, as this short piece from Agence France-Presse demonstrates.

By AFP , May 30, 2022

Key words: Threats to journalists; Honduras; Committee for Freedom of Expression (C-Libre).

 

A journalist died in May in Honduras days after being shot, the fourth journalist killed so far this year in the country and the 97th since 2001, a freedom of expression organisation denounced.

The executive director of the Committee for Freedom of Expression (C-Libre), Amada Ponce, told AFP that Ricardo Alcides Avila, 25, died in a Tegucigalpa hospital after being shot in the head on Wednesday by unknown assailants in the south of the country.

Ponce said Avila was a journalist and cameraman for the Metro television and radio station in the city of Choluteca, 85 km south of the capital. “On the morning of May 26, he was traveling from his home in the community of Santa Cruz to his work in Choluteca, and there he was intercepted by unknown persons who shot him at very close range,” he said.

Avila was taken to a hospital in the capital.

Hours later, the police claimed that it was a common criminal assault. Ponce said, however, that “C-Libre has been able to confirm that it was not an assault. At the scene they found the young man’s backpack with 9,000 lempiras (about 367 dollars), his cell phone, his personal documents, keys and the motorcycle (on which he was riding), completely unharmed.”.

For C-Libre, the murder “is because of the work Ricardo was doing (…) linked to social movements” in the southern part of the country. He stressed that a few days before he was killed, Avila told his co-workers that he had to change his phone because he believed it had been hacked.

 

Impunity

“This is an important element that the police have not investigated” and perhaps did not report it “because of the little credibility that the police have,” the C-Libre director commented. She pointed out that the committee has issued alerts of frequent threats received by personnel of the channel and Radio Metro because of their editorial line.

Ponce denounced that four journalists have been murdered so far this year and that since 2001, a total of 97 journalists, media owners and employees have died violent deaths in the Central American country.

In a statement on Avila’s death, C-Libre demanded that “the Public Prosecutor’s Office should have a protocol for the investigation of violent deaths of journalists and social communicators”.

The committee assured that since the 2009 coup d’état against then president Manuel Zelaya, husband of current president Xiomara Castro, “attacks and murders against journalists have increased”.

“Honduras is placed by international human rights organisations among the most dangerous countries for the practice of journalism”, she said. This in spite of the fact that in the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) carried out by the United Nations Human Rights Committee, “In the UPR, the authorities committed the State to establish the necessary measures to provide protection to journalists, investigate, prosecute crimes and convict those responsible,” she said.

But “crimes against the press continue and more than 90% remain unpunished,” she added.

2016 assassinations of union and community rights defenders in Guatemala

Chapter 9 / Troublesome trade unionists

Context

2016 has witnessed an increase in fatal attacks on human rights defenders in Guatemala. From January 1st to October 31st, eleven human rights defenders were killed and since October 31st, the killings have escalated, and by November 18th the total number of defenders killed came to 16. (The total for 2015 was 13.)

Union members and community leaders

On 10th May, community leader Blanca Estela Asturias was shot to death in Villalobos, Guatemala. Two men approached her as she was at her newspaper stand at 6 am and shot her at point blank range. She had recently organised a protest to call for better water service and better maintenance of the community’s drainage system.

screen-shot-2016-12-28-at-08-29-49On 19th June at about 6 pm, Brenda Marleni Estrada Tambito (shown left) was driving through Zone 1 of Guatemala City when a vehicle drove up next to her. The occupants of the vehicle opened fire and killed her. She was a member of the Coalition of Workers’ Unions of Guatemala (UNSITRAGUA) and the sub-coordinator of the Legal Aid Commission within the union. UNSITRAGUA brings together workers’ unions from different industries, as well as self-employed workers and independent farmers. She was the daughter of lawyer Jorge Estrada, who is currently involved in investigating and assessing labour rights in several banana plantations in Izabal.

On 10th November, Eliseo Villatoro Cardona was riding home on his motorcycle when two pursuers, also on motorcycles, shot and wounded him. Despite his wounds, he tried to flee, but the gunmen continued to chase him and killed him. Villatoro Cardona was a member of the executive committee of the Organised Municipal Employees’ Union of Tiquisate (SEMOT) in Escuintla.

Sources:

A variety of sources have been used in the compilation of the lists above. These include: Prensa Libre, Aquitodito, Cerigua, Radio La Franja, Front Line Defenders, Committee to Protect Journalists, NISGUA, UNESCO, Reporteros Sin Fronteras, Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA (GHRC).

The GHRC’s ‘Preliminary 2016 Human Rights Review’ has been particularly helpful and this was the work of Imogene Caird and Pat Davis, to whom I am especially grateful. The GHRC’s website is: www.ghrc-usa.org/

Defending Rights Defenders

Chapter 9 / Troublesome Lawyers and Human Rights Defenders

It is now almost a year since the Environmental Network for Central America (ENCA) hosted an event entitled ‘Defending Rights Defenders’ on board the Tattershall Castle, a boat moored on the River Thames. My apologies to all the readers of the TVOD website monthly updates that we have not managed to upload a report of the event until now. Anyway, better late than never.

ENCA was strongly supported by Peace Brigades International (PBI), OFRANEH (Black Fraternal Organisation of Honduras), the Guatemala Solidarity Network and the Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign. The event explored both the causes and potential solutions to the dangers of being a defender of land rights, environmental rights and human rights in Central America, attracted 140 people and provided a platform for discussion and solidarity.

The event was chaired by Doug Specht from the University of Westminster who introduced three speakers: Martin Mowforth, author of ‘The Violence of Development’ opened the talks with a contextual introduction to the northern triangle of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras) where life for rights defenders is extremely dangerous. He cited research by the Centre for International Environmental Law (CIEL) and Global Witness that stated that since the 2009 military coup d’état in Honduras, 123 land and environmental activists have been murdered in that country with countless others threatened, attacked or imprisoned. The situation for rights defenders in El Salvador and Guatemala can hardly be described as any better than for Hondurans.

Following this introduction we were delighted to be joined by Aurelia Martina Arzú Rochez, vice-coordinator and spiritual guide of OFRANEH, who gave a powerful and personal account of living with the oppression of being an activist in Honduras. The Garífuna people are currently experiencing illegal takeovers of their ancestral lands by Canadian investors who are intent on developing a tourism industry that caters to wealthy foreign cruise passengers but which displaces and dispossesses the Garífuna people from their land. Moreover they suffer constant criminalisation by the authorities which are intent on protecting international investors rather than Honduran people.

More case studies of abuses of rights defenders from around the region were then presented. Following Aurelia and the other case studies, Emily Spence of Peace Brigades International took to the stage to explore ways in which rights defenders can be defended and supported through the work of PBI and other solidarity networks. The presentations were rounded off with a lively and interesting Q&A session.

While the presentations may have concluded on a sober note, the feeling of solidarity and the importance of pushing forward for new and better ways of living and fighting for rights was, quite literally, drummed home by the Pengenista samba-reggae drum band who capped off the evening with a lively range of dance and protest songs that got the whole room on its feet to join in celebration of what can be achieved when we engage in solidarity.

Below are just a few pictures and videos from the evening.

Aurelia Arzú

Aurelia with interpreter Sandra Young and Emily Spence of Peace Brigades International

The Pengenista samba-reggae drum band strut their stuff after the presentations

Video clips used in the presentations:

 

Human Rights Defender Murdered in Jalapa Campesino Organisation Targeted

Chapter 9 / Troublesome Lawyers and Human Rights Defenders

Guatemala Human Rights Commission (ghrcusa)

9th December 2022

The body of Tereso Carcamo Flores was found, riddled with bullets on December 5, some 600 meters from his home in Santa María Xalapán, Jalapa. Flores was returning home from a wake in El Volcán, when he was attacked by armed men and killed. According to Flores’ family, he had been receiving threats for months, related to his involvement with the Campesino Development Committee (CODECA) and his work supporting Indigenous communities’ struggle for land in the area.

He had been a member of CODECA for over nine years. According to another of the organisation’s leaders, Leiria Vay, these attacks are commonplace and in line with a pattern of violence against CODECA and human rights defenders in the region. “There are groups in alliance with mafias and hitmen that want to maintain power, they always act in the same way,” he explained. Flores’ death marks the 25th murder of members of CODECA since 2018, all of which remain in impunity.

Emergencies in children’s homes in both Guatemala and Honduras

Chapter 9 / Troublesome street children

We include a summary here of the recent problems faced by the organisation Casa Alianza in Honduras and Guatemala. Casa Alianza is a non-governmental organisation that defends and protects street children in several capital cities in Latin America, among them Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, and Guatemala City, the capital of Guatemala. In both cases the organisation has centres which serve as places of refuge for the children and as medical and learning centres too. More background details about the two centres run by Casa Alianza can be found at the following websites:

In March 2024, the Casa Alianza centre in Guatemala City had to evacuate all its resident girls and staff when there was a leak of highly toxic, illegal agrochemicals next to their building. The alert came when girls and staff suddenly experienced symptoms such as headaches, dizziness, eye irritation, throat irritation and numbing of their tongues, among others.

At the time, there were 50 girls and eight babies (six toddlers and two newborns) who were affected. Two of the girls were pregnant, one of whom was only 12 years old, a survivor of abuse. Although two of the babies and a 15 year old girl were hospitalised, the rest spent the following nights in a facility run by the National Youth Council of Guatemala.

One month earlier in February 2024, in Tegucigalpa, a major fire erupted one block from the primary youth residence of Casa Alianza. Staff of the centre quickly moved all 70 children and youth into a church to pass the night. They evacuated with nothing but the clothes on their backs and slippers on their feet.

The following day, they spent the day in a park while the team of staff worked to arrange temporary housing at a nearby retreat, where they remained until it was safe to return to the Casa Alianza Centre.

Sources:

  • Compass Children’s Charity, 17 March 2024, ‘Urgent Appeal – La Alianza, Guatemala: Emergency Evacuation’
  • Alicia Caraballo, Linkedin Post, 11 February 2024.
  • Also refer to the websites listed above.

Honduran lawmakers seek to permanently ban abortion

Chapter 9 / Troublesome women

By Pamela Machado, February 2021

We are grateful to Pamela, a Brazilian journalist, for her summary of the situation faced by women in Honduras.

Key words: abortion ban; Honduran National Congress; hypermasculinity; femicide.

 

More threats to the lives of women in Central America: On January 21st, legislators in Honduras voted on an amendment to permanently ban abortions in the country. Honduras already has a full ban on abortions; the new proposal aims to make it hard to be overturned – ever.

The bill was put forward by the Deputy for the ruling National Party, Mario Pérez, on the grounds that abortion is “a practice against human nature”. In the proposed bill, any changes to abortion rights would require a three quarters majority vote, which is higher than usual.

The amendment will have to be ratified by the Congress in a year, but it is widely regarded as a mere formality. Only 27 of the 128 seats in the Honduran Congreso Nacional are held by women.

The move in Honduras came shortly after Argentina became the largest country in Latin America to legalise abortion after decades of campaigning by women’s rights movements. There is little doubt that the bill in Honduras represented a backlash to the victory in Argentina.

Just a few days later, on January 25th, the Honduran Women’s Day, hundreds of women took to the streets of Tegucigalpa to protest against the bill. ‘We have nothing to celebrate,’ said Ana Cruz from the women’s rights organisation Asociación de Calidad de Vida to news agency EFE, “we are here to demand that they respect our rights.”

Latin American countries are amongst the worst in the world in safeguarding women’s rights, and Central America has a particularly dire reputation when it comes to access to contraception and safe abortion. Beyond Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua also have a complete ban on abortion. In El Salvador women can face up to 40 years in prison for any attempts to end pregnancy or even suffering miscarriage. It is reported that 18 innocent women are held currently in prison in the country for alleged ‘abortion-related’ crimes.

Women in Latin America not only bear the burden of social tensions but also suffer from a culture that reveres hypermasculinity and conservative politics. Banning abortions only serves to increase stigma and worsen women’s health conditions as they are left with dangerous options to terminate pregnancies. According to data from the World Health Organisation, 3 out of 4 abortions in Latin America are deemed unsafe.

The collective Somos Muchas says that around 8,600 women were taken to a hospital due to complications of unsafe abortion in Honduras in 2017. The group gathered hundreds of signatures internationally in a call to oppose the bill.

In addition to unsafe conditions for abortions, women in Honduras also struggle with high rates of femicides. In 2020, approximately 300 women were victims of femicide in Honduras.

 

Activists are Dying for Your Food: Environmental Defenders Murdered in Record Numbers Last Year

Chapter 9 / Chapter 2 / Case studies / Troublesome environmentalists

I am grateful to Sandra Cuffe and to the progressive organisation Toward Freedom for permission to reproduce this article here. Although the article refers to environmental defenders in many parts of the world, it is also relevant to Central America where the abuses and threats suffered by environmental defenders are as bad as or worse than those suffered elsewhere in the world.

By Sandra Cuffe, July 25, 2018 

https://towardfreedom.org/archives/environment/activists-are-dying-for-your-food-environmental-defenders-murdered-in-record-numbers-last-year/

It could be your morning coffee, your bananas, your sugar, or the palm oil found in approximately half of all packaged products at your grocery store, including breakfast cereals. Land and environmental defenders were killed in record numbers last year, and for the first time, agribusiness is tied to more killings than any other sector, according to a report published Tuesday by Global Witness, a London-based NGO (https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/environmental-activists/at-what-cost/).

The organisation documented 207 killings of land and environmental defenders in 22 countries around the world in 2017, a slight increase from 2016. However, the number of people killed while protesting large-scale agriculture in 2017 more than doubled.

“For the first time, agribusiness surpassed mining as the most dangerous sector to oppose, as 46 defenders who protested against palm oil, coffee, tropical fruit and sugar cane plantations, as well as cattle ranching, were murdered in 2017,” noted the authors of ‘At What Cost?’, the Global Witness report.

Last year also saw a rise in massacres, many of which were linked to agribusiness conflicts. Global Witness documented seven cases in which more than four land and environmental defenders were killed. In Brazil, three massacres had a combined death toll of 25, more than 40 percent of the total 57 defenders killed last year – the most killings Global Witness has ever recorded in any country.

In the Philippines, killings of activists and community leaders skyrocketed. “President Duterte’s aggressively anti-human-rights stance and a renewed military presence in resource-rich regions are fuelling the violence. Almost half of the [48] killings in the Philippines were linked to struggles against agribusiness,” according to the report.

On the southern island of Mindanao, an indigenous village leader engaged in a heated struggle against the expansion of a coffee plantation, and four of his relatives, and two other residents were all killed by soldiers on December 3. The government claimed the deaths were the outcome of fighting between the army and leftist guerrilla forces, but there was little evidence to support the claim. Between the government’s announcement that it would earmark more lands for industrial plantations and the increased militarization of Mindanao, killings of locals opposing land grabs are unlikely to cease.

Global Witness identified several root causes underlying threats to defenders, regardless of whether cases are tied to agribusiness, mining, logging, or other activities. Corruption and impunity are on the list, but so is the failure to recognise customary or collective land rights and secure land tenure. Failure to seek the free, prior and informed consent of affected communities also underpins the violence, according to the organisation.

“Local activists are being murdered as governments and businesses value quick profit over human life. Many of the products emerging from this bloodshed are on the shelves of our supermarkets,” said Ben Leather, a Senior Campaigner at Global Witness.

A United Nations intergovernmental working group continued to work on its draft of a binding international instrument concerning transnational corporations, but at the moment, most international guidelines concerning business and human rights are just that: guidelines. They’re voluntary. Products are sometimes labelled ‘sustainable’ by industry-led groups regardless of the facts on the ground.

Sugar and palm oil linked to violence and killings can be ingredients in all kinds of everyday products. Amnesty International traced palm oil from Indonesian plantations with reported human rights abuses to nine multinational food and household corporations with dozens of brands.

“We invite consumers to join us in campaigning alongside defenders, taking their fight to the corridors of power and the boardrooms of corporations. We will make sure their voices are heard,” said Leather.

Whether they are linked to conflicts over agribusiness or extractive industries, killings are at the extreme end of the spectrum of violence and harassment against land and environmental defenders.

A banner highlighting the legitimacy of resistance hangs along the road in Casillas, Guatemala, where a regional resistance movement has shut down traffic to Tahoe Resources’ Escobal mine for more than a year. (Photo: Sandra Cuffe)



Criminalization, death threats, sexual assault, and intimidation are everyday occurrences in many parts of the world.

Franklin Almendares is all too familiar with targeted intimidation. The head of the National Centre for Rural Workers (CNTC), he had been meeting with representatives from other Honduran land rights organisations this past February to discuss land struggles and the ongoing political crisis in the country, and there was much to talk about.

It was after midnight by the time he left the meeting. There was almost no traffic in Tegucigalpa at that time of night, but Almendares did not make it more than three blocks from the meeting when a vehicle suddenly crashed into his. Due to past attacks against him, Almendares opted to keep driving, but the other vehicle maneuvered around to the front of his, blocking his path. Two of the four men got out, pulled Almendares from his vehicle, frisked him for a weapon, and searched his bag.

“The only thing they robbed was my agenda,” Almendares told Toward Freedom. It was not the first time this had happened to him. “I’ve had my agenda stolen four times,” he said.

A police patrol truck had suddenly appeared a few minutes after the incident and officers tried to convince Almendares to get in and accompany them to search for the perpetrators. He declined, and the police officers did not bother to take notes, ask for details, or even inspect vehicle damage before leaving.

Almendares decided to go to the police station downtown to file a formal report, but he was intercepted along the way by a different police patrol truck, this time with both police and military personnel aboard. They knew who he was and what had happened. Fearing for his safety, Almendares declined their offer to accompany him and quickly took off for home, making sure he wasn’t followed. Regional CNTC leaders also face frequent intimidation, threats, and attacks.

“At CNTC we’re in a permanent state of crisis,” said Almendares. “Lands are being handed over for monoculture crops, dams and mining.”

Thousands of campesinos have been criminalized, and both public security forces and paramilitary groups have been attacking communities defending their lands, he said. Between the increasing concentration of power since the 2009 coup d’état and the fiercely contested re-election of President Juan Orlando Hernández last November, Almendares expects things to get even worse, and he is not alone.

The new Global Witness report addressed Honduras in its review of trends in 2017. The group documented four killings of land and environmental defenders in the country, a sharp drop from the 14 in 2016. However, Honduras still had the second most killings per capita in 2017, after seven consecutive years with the notorious distinction of holding the lead. Despite a drop in killings, repression of human rights defenders in general increased, as did attacks, the report authors noted.

In neighbouring Guatemala, killings have shot up drastically this year. To date in 2018, at least a dozen land and environmental defenders have been killed, and most of them were indigenous. According to the Human Rights Defenders Protection Unit of Guatemala (UDEFEGUA), the first eleven killings this year included five Campesino Development Committee (CODECA) members, three members of the Campesino Committee of the Highlands (CCDA), a Maya Chorti community leader, a Quetzaltenango social pastoral land group affiliate, and a member of the Coordination of Communities Affected by Sugar Cane Agribusiness.

“In 2018, it’s possible to predict a greater risk, not just due to the political and social context but also because the cost of attacking a defender has greatly dropped due to the inaction, tolerance, complicity and behaviour of the state, opening the door for state and non-state actors to consider that impunity will be guaranteed if they act against [defenders],” UDEFEGUA noted in a report published earlier this year.

This month, on July 12, another Guatemalan defender was killed. Ángel Estuardo Quevedo, a community leader from Casillas, Santa Rosa, was shot several times in broad daylight. He was an active participant in the powerful regional resistance movement to Tahoe Resources’ Escobal mine, and was involved in coordinating the rotation of residents participating in protest actions.

Locals from several municipalities in the area have been working together for more than a year to maintain an ongoing roadside protest in Casillas to block mine traffic and stop mine production. The movement also maintains a round-the-clock presence outside the Constitutional Court in Guatemala City pending a ruling concerning the mine.

For years, community leaders, activists and residents organised in opposition to the Escobal mine have been killed, attacked, jailed, and threatened. Miguel Ángel Payeras is one of the countless Casillas residents who experienced repression last year, when police attempted to violently evict the roadside protest camp in order to escort fuel to the mining project.

“They came with the intention of fighting with us,” Payeras told Toward Freedom in an interview last year. “They shot tear gas at people running away.”

A diabetic with vision and leg issues, Payeras uses a wheelchair and was unable to flee. Police dragged him away in his chair, and the foot in which he has no feeling was dragged along underneath the footrest, hitting his ankle over and over. Despite the repression, people regrouped and others poured in from nearby communities and other municipalities to maintain the protest camp and the selective roadblock to prevent mining operations. The resistance has continued every single day since.

If the first half of this year is any indication, the next annual Global Witness report could very well reveal that Guatemala took over as the country with the most per capita killings of land and environmental defenders in 2018. Despite the life-and-death stakes, defenders are not backing down.

“We’ll be here until the mine is shut down,” said Payeras. “If they kill me, I’ll die in the struggle.”

Sandra Cuffe is a freelance journalist based in Honduras. You can find her on twitter at @Sandra_Cuffe or read more of her work on her website at sandracuffe.com

Toward Freedom (https://towardfreedom.org/) is an organisation that has been offering a progressive perspective on world affairs since 1952.

Honduras most dangerous country for environmental activists

Chapter 9 / Troublesome environmentalists

By Anastasia Moloney

BOGOTA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Honduras is the deadliest place for environmental activists with scores of Hondurans killed defending land rights and the environment from mining, dam projects and logging, a campaign group said on Monday.

Between 2010 and 2014, 101 activists were murdered in Honduras, the highest rate per capita of any country surveyed in a report by Global Witness, although the overall number was greatest in Brazil.

Globally, killings of environmental activists reached an average of more than two per week in 2014, up 20 percent from the previous year, the report said.

A man looks for usable items in a dumpsite on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, April 17, 2015. | Reuters/Jorge Cabrera.

A man looks for usable items in a dumpsite on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, April 17, 2015. | Reuters/Jorge Cabrera.

Latin America fared worst, accounting for nearly three quarters of the murders – with 29 deaths reported in Brazil, 25 in Colombia and 12 in Honduras.

“Historically there has been very unequal land distribution in Latin America which has caused conflict between local and foreign companies and communities,” Billy Kyte, campaigner at Global Witness, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“Governments in Latin America are by no means taking this problem seriously. Impunity levels are also very high so perpetrators of crime get away with it,” he said.

The report found 40 percent of environmental defenders killed last year were indigenous people caught on the frontline as they tried to defend land and water sources from companies in an escalating scramble for natural resources and land.

“Many indigenous groups lack clear land titles to their land and suffer land grabs by powerful business interests,” the report said.

Honduran activist, Martin Fernandez, said he was forced to flee for safety to Brazil for three months in 2012 after he received telephone death threats and was followed by cars with black tinted windows near his work and home.

“We live in fear, in fear of constant attack. I and many colleagues have had to live in exile,” Fernandez, head of the Movement for Dignity and Justice, a Honduran land rights group, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a telephone interview.

He said Honduran and foreign companies were exploiting indigenous lands and clearing forests, particularly in the northern Yoro province where the Tolupan indigenous group live, to make way for dam construction and mining projects.

In its report, Global Witness said the Honduran government hoped to attract $4 billion in mining investments and recently freed up 250,000 hectares of land for new mining projects.

With the world’s highest murder rate, Honduras is struggling to contain drug-fuelled gang violence and organized crime. The government did not respond to requests for comment on the Global Witness report.

Heightened dangers faced by environmental activists in Honduras are likely to be raised next month at the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council when the country’s rights record comes under review.

(Reporting By Anastasia Moloney; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

10 femicides in first 11 days of August 2020 in El Salvador

Chapter 9 / The scale and nature of present day violence / Troublesome women

By Martin Mowforth

Key words: femicide; ECLAC/CEPAL; El Salvador; ORMUSA.

According to the Guatemala Human Rights Commission (GHRC), femicide is not simply the murder of females but rather the killing of females by males because they are female. It is a form of terrorism that functions to define gender lines, enact and bolster male dominance, and to render women chronically and profoundly unsafe.

According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, femicide is expressed in absolute numbers and rate per 100,000 women. National laws differ, but it is referred to as femicide, feminicide or aggravated homicide due to gender.

El Salvador has the highest rate of femicide in Latin America. On 13th August 2020 La Prensa Gráfica reported that ten women were murdered in the first eleven days of August, one of these being a minor.

Silvia Juárez, a representative of the Organisation of Salvadoran Women for Peace (ORMUSA), warned others to be alert to the dangers of violence against them: “In May we had ten cases of violent deaths throughout the whole month, but in these first days of August we already have the same number. It’s extremely dangerous as some of these women were assassinated in their houses.”

ORMUSA gave a total of 65 women assassinated from the beginning of the year to the 5th August, although the Salvadoran Attorney General said that 47 of these were femicides. The Attorney General lamented the deaths and urged the authorities to take a more active role in increasing the personal security of women and to eradicate the acts of hatred that cause this aggression against women.

Sources:

United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC, or CEPAL by its Spanish initials): oig.cepal.org/en/indicators/femicide-or-feminicide

Andrea Rivas and Javier Urbina, 13 August 2020, ‘Reportan 10 asesinatos de mujeres durante agosto’, La Prensa Gráfica, San Salvador.

Beatriz Calderon and Juan Carlos Díaz, 5 Agosto 2020, ‘Dos mujeres fueron asesinadas en Usulután’, La Prensa Gráfica, San Salvador.

Wikipedia, ‘Femicide’, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femicide