Honduras
The Summits of the Americas began in 1994 as forums to promote free trade. In 2009 the Summit's focus shifted to demands for the inclusion of Cuba in regional political bodies and the end of the U.S. economic embargo, a debate which continued in this month's Sixth Summit in Cartagena.
Protest the Congressional Hispanic Leadership Institute (CHLI) giving Honduran regime leader Pepe Lobo a "leadership award"
Goldcorp completes its AGM (annual general meeting) in Canada. The status quo is intact:
- There continues to be no legal or political accountability in Canada (let alone in Honduras and Guatemala)
- There will be no compensation or reparations for environmental and health harms and other human rights violations caused by Goldcorp's mines in Guatemala and Honduras (and beyond)
- Thus far, no comment from pension funds and equity funds across North America that are invested in Goldcorp
Dina Meza, a Honduran journalist and human rights activist, has received a series of threats of sexual violence against her in recent weeks. Her safety is at risk. Dina Meza reports on human rights issues for the website Defenders Online (Defensores en Linea).
Rights Action's response to a recent article: "Goldcorp looks to export relationship model in addition to gold from Eléonore project", by Alex Létourneau of Kitco News, published by Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/kitconews/2012/03/19/goldcorp-looks-to-export-relationship-model-in-addition-to-gold-from-eleonore-project/
UN independent experts call on Honduras to adopt measures to stop killing of lawyers
Politically motivated killings apparently by death squads have been growing over the past few years in Central America, and concern in Guatemala is heightened as the new administration has brought back to public office many of the same individuals directly implicated in the State repression and genocide of the 1980s.
PLEASE CALL, in Spanish or (even) in English, to Colonel Paz. Dial: 011 [504] 9867-2975.
Ask Colonel Paz about the well-being and whereabouts of Juan Galindo and Oveniel Caceres.Ask for the reason of their detention and express concern for the lack of due process given that no arrest warrant was presented.
Honduras is just days away from approving an extremist law that would put teenagers in prison for using the morning-after pill, even if they've just been raped.
The land disputes date back to efforts in the 1960s to entice landless farmers to the fertile region of the Bajo Aguan. The initial agrarian reform laws contained protections intended to ensure that the land remained in the hands of small landowners by limiting the amount of hectares individuals could accumulate. In 1992, the Law for Modernisation of Land gutted many of the protections written into the original agrarian reform efforts, creating pressure on peasant land cooperatives to sell their land to large landowners.
