130 environmental activists have been murdered in the past decade

February 17, 2019 2:06 PM

France24 Reporters Plus—“A life of exile: How drought is forcing Hondurans to flee to US” (~25min video, in English, alt link) While members of a diaspora community in Durham, North Carolina send their support, Honduran people of the indigenous Lenca deal with drought and fight against environmental destruction and exploitation on the Petacón River.

Some context: 2009 FPP “Army overthrows Honduras president”, 2010 FPP about US support for the coup, other Honduras-related posts, and the 2016 assassination of Berta Cáceres, a leader in the community of the Lenca people who fought another dam project.

posted by XMLicious (4 comments total)

The pattern of climate change and environmental destruction forcing migration, then the absence and disempowerment of the people facilitating international corporations and other capitalist hegemony moving in and exploiting, is reminiscent of the aftermath of hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. I'm sure a similar pattern has been ceaselessly repeated in the course of colonialism and imperialism since canals and soil-contaminating irrigation systems were built in ancient Mesopotamia.
posted by XMLicious at 2:09 PM on February 17, 2019 [4 favorites]

The future is here. We are doing poorly.
posted by Anchorite_of_Palgrave at 8:05 AM on February 18, 2019

I'd missed that there were convictions in the Cáceres case a few months ago: Berta Cáceres: Seven convicted of murdering anti-dam activist

Judges at the court in Tegucigalpa on Thursday said two officials from the construction firm Desa - Sergio Rodríguez and Douglas Bustillo - had helped organise the killing along with former soldier Mariano Díaz.

[...]

Desa executive Roberto David Castillo is still awaiting trial in the case. He has denied any wrongdoing.

posted by XMLicious at 3:19 AM on February 23, 2019

Al Jazeera English: Women land defenders face 'extreme criminalisation', added risks

Guatemala is one of the most dangerous countries worldwide for natural resource conflicts, with 26 land rights defenders murdered in 2018, more than double than the year before, according to Frontline Defenders' annual report.

Of the 321 rights defenders killed worldwide that same year, Frontline Defenders found that 75 percent were in Latin America, where relaxed regulations, corruption and weak protections for defenders often mean such murders go unpunished.

posted by XMLicious at 3:01 AM on March 3, 2019 [1 favorite]