Activists' Murders Show Human Rights Under Assault in Latin America Christine Wade - World Politics Review
go to original March 21, 2016

Women carry images of slain environmental activist Berta Caceres, Tegucigalpa, Honduras, March 8, 2016. (AP/Fernando Antonio)

On March 3, Berta Caceres, a prominent indigenous and environmental activist, was murdered in her home in La Esperanza, Intibuca, in the mountains of Honduras. Caceres was a campaigner for the rights of her native people, the Lenca, and a staunch opponent of one of Central America’s biggest dam projects. Her shocking murder was but the first recent example of the growing threat to human rights activists across Latin America.

Less than two weeks after Caceres’ assassination, her fellow activist Nelson Garcia was murdered during a community eviction in the village of Rio Chiquito in northern Honduras. The next day, Guatemalan environmental activist Walter Mendez Barrios was murdered. Mendez, a member of the Association of Forest Communities of Peten, had been an opponent of hydroelectric dam projects along the Usumacinta River in northwestern Guatemala.

Their deaths came after a bit of good news for human rights defenders in the region. In February, police in El Salvador arrested four former military officers in connection with one of the most notorious atrocities of the country’s 12-year civil war: the 1989 murders of six Jesuits, their housekeeper and her 15-year-old daughter at the University of Central America in San Salvador.

The officers were arrested under a Spanish arrest warrant - five of the six Jesuits were Spanish - seeking their extradition, which was originally issued in May 2011. The fate of the arrested officers, as well as another 12 missing officers named in the warrant, is currently pending before the Salvadoran Supreme Court.

Read the rest at World Politics Review

Related: Letter from Gustavo Castro to the Honduran People (Scoop)

Related: Human Rights Council Holds Debate on the State of Racial Discrimination Worldwide (Diplomatic Intelligence)

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!