Statement from the rural, peasant and indigenous communities of Honduras
We, the members of CLACSO Working Group Critical Studies of Rural Development Before the national and international community, we condemn the human rights violations and the due process of defense of the 8 environmentalists from Guapinol who are being held in the maximum security prison in Honduras.
-Since the 2009 coup, peasant and indigenous communities in Honduras have experienced constant repression and criminalization by the government and military and paramilitary forces.
-Violence and criminalization against human rights defenders and defenders of common goods is sponsored by businessmen, landowners, the military and the Courts of Justice.
Since 2014, communities and human rights and commons defense organizations have been resisting the opening of an iron oxide mine, which would affect the Guapinol and San Pedro rivers and the Carlos Escaleros National Park in Montaña el Botadero, located in Tocoa, Colón, Honduras. In August 2018, the “Guapinol Camp in Defense of Water and Life” began, which has been subjected to constant police and military repression, culminating in a violent eviction in October of that same year, after 88 days of sit-in.
We express our deep concern about the serious criminalization of defenders of these rivers. Currently, the Honduran state has imprisoned seven defenders of the Guapinol River in a maximum-security prison and one in the La Ceiba prison. There are also several open cases against individuals who have participated in this movement.
We express our solidarity with our colleague Irma Lemuz Amaya, a member of the CLACSO Working Group on Critical Studies of Rural Development, who, as a defender of human rights and common goods, has suffered constant attacks and threats against her life and the lives of her loved ones. Irma has joined the long list of women and men in Honduras who are in exile due to these constant threats against their lives.
We denounce the threats against our comrade Irma as not an isolated incident, but rather a systematic practice of harassment, persecution, and violence against those who oppose extractive projects of death and plunder. For this reason, we join the voices denouncing the constant attacks against women defenders of land and territory.
September 2019
CLACSO Working Group
Critical studies of rural development
This statement expresses the position of the members of the Working Group on Critical Studies of Rural Development and not necessarily that of the centers and institutions that make up the CLACSO international network, its Steering Committee or its Executive Secretariat.
