Rights Action - December 16, 2010
HONDURAS Repression Unabated:
2 Communities Occupied by Military, 3 People Shot, 13 Detained

 

AGUAN - COPINH
(Army & Police riot forces, Aguan region, northern Honduras. December 15, 2010, photo: COPINH)

BELOW:

* URGENT ACTION - December 15th attack on poor campesinos in Zacate Grande, southern Honduras; further repression against poor campesinos in Aguan, northern Honduras
* LETTER WRITING NEEDED: see US and Canadian addresses below
* FUNDS NEEDED for humanitarian relief for attacked communities in Zacate Grande and the Aguan region: How to donate, see below

 

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PREDICTABLE, ENDLESS REPRESSION CONTINUES IN HONDURAS
Rights Action, December 16, 2010

In the community of Coyolitos (peninsula of Zacate Grande, southern Honduras), police from the department of Valle, soldiers from the 11th Battalion of the Army and private security guards opened fire on the local population on December 15.  Three people were gravely injured and twelve people detained - then removed from the area by police; their whereabouts are unknown.  Among the detained were two who had been injured and were profusely bleeding, and two others are journalists for the community radio, La Voz de Zacate Grande.

As recently reported, on November 15, five campesinos were killed in cold blood in the community of Guadalupe Carney, Aguan region on the north coast of Honduras.  Read: http://rightsaction.org/articles/Hond_Colon_Conflict_update_120410.html

The de facto Honduran government, put in power after the June 2009 military coup, is (as expected) brutalizing communities in favour of the financial interests of those who supported the coup.  Miguel Facusse - one of the largest landowners in Honduras - was a supporter/defender of the coup and is linked to the November 15 deaths in the Aguan region, and to yesterday's repression in Zacate Grande.

The December 15 repression in Zacate Grande is also related to climate change mechanisms.  Miguel Facusse aims to profit from palm oil production and "forest conservation".

Human rights violations, repression and deeply entrenched impunity - widely documented in Honduras following the June 2009 military coup - are the very conditions that make this kind of "investment" possible, investments based on the use of repression against poor people living on and who have valid legal claims to the lands in question.

This makes multilateral investment banks and climate change mechanisms investing in post- coup Honduras complicit in the repression that is resulting from their investments.

REPRESSION IN ZACATE GANDE & AGUAN
Violent actions by the Honduran police and military are taking place today (December 15) simultaneously in the peninsula of Zacate Grande (in the community Coyalitos, Department of Valle, southern Honduras) and in the Aguan region (in the community of Guadalupe Carney, near Trujillo, Department of Colon, north coast of Honduras).

Rights Action is extremely concerned for the safety of the residents of both communities.

In Zacate Grande, police from the department of Valle, soldiers from the 11th Battalion of the Infantry, and armed guards from a private security company, entered the community of Coyalitos and fired on the population.  Two people (Marvin Aleman and Gladys Mejia) were gravely injured, and twelve people were detained by police. Two of those detained are journalists for the "La Voz de Zacate Grande" community radio (Elba Rubio Bonilla and Elia Xiomara Hernandez).

The two injured are hospitalized and the twelve are being detained in the Nacaome prison: Armando Maldonado Perez, Jaquelin Flores, Nelly Colon, Carmen Granados, Edeybi Aleman, Santos Flores Lagos, Nasario Flores Lagos, Reynaldo Estrada Oliva, Erlin Cruz Rivera, Edwin Omar Flores Lagos.

In the Aguan region, Guadalupe Carney, a community of approximately 1,200 families, is now occupied by between 500 and 1000 heavily armed police and military and is being watched by a helicopter. Soldiers are surrounding the community, not just on the roads but in the hills and forests.

It was reported by a community leader that the military/police are trying to confiscate the Guadalupe Carney community radio equipment. There have also been reports that hooded soldiers are confiscating cell phones and machetes. Access in and out of the community for residents has been limited as well.

Five members of MUCA (the Unified Campesino Movement of the Aguan) were reportedly detained outside of the community of Guadalupe Carney by private security guards and their whereabouts are still unknown.

Guadalupe Carney has title to their land.  Named after a loved and respected American priest, Jim Carney, who was killed by the Honduran regime in 1981, the Guadalupe Carney community was established in 2000, and the community's land is not in conflict.  Over the past week, the MCA (Aguan Campesino Movement), the MUCA and members of the resistance movement from the region have maintained a road block in front of Guadalupe Carney in protest of the aggression by the Honduran military and de facto government against the campesino movement in the Aguan, particularly the November 15, 2010 massacre of 5 campesinos from Guadalupe Carney by security forces employed by the Dinant Corporation.  (Read: http://rightsaction.org/articles/Hond_Colon_Conflict_update_120410.html)  A minimum of 19 campesinos have been killed in the Aguan since the June 2009 coup.

Back in the Zacate Grande region, community leaders report that the pretext for the attack on Coyolitos was an "eviction" notice, "officially" resulting from default on a mortgage held by HSBC bank.  However, the person who supposedly mortgaged the property has never lived there, and that the HSBC bank plans to sell lands to the same investment group that is attempting to consolidate control of all of Zacate Grande.

Most poor, campesino families on the Zacate Grande peninsula have lived there for at least four generations, but as national law had prohibited private titling of beach front lands they had never obtained titles.  The 1994 Land Modernization Law allowed private titling, but before the residents knew what had happened, Honduran businessman and land baron Miguel Facusse and his associates had gained dubious titles through irregular means.

MIGUEL FACUSSE & OTHER LAND BARONS
Both Zacate Grande and Guadalupe Carney are immersed in land conflicts with Miguel Facusse and associates, who benefit from Clean Development Mechanism funding and plan to benefit from financial incentives for bio-fuel production related to palm oil processing.

Palm oil plantations controlled by a Facusse-related corporation are located on lands that residents of Guadalupe Carney have rights over.  In addition, reports exist that other Facusse-related initiatives are intended to participate in pilot projects for REDD+ (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation plus additional forest "activities"), reportedly slated to begin in Honduras, gaining carbon credits for "preserving" forests on Zacate Grande.

Miguel Facusse and other agro-business and carbon credit interests backed the June 2009 military coup in Honduras.  Under the administration of the ousted President Manuel Zelaya, agro-business land titles flawed by illegalities were being challenged and the process of returning lands to campesino communities was being initiated.

However, the military coup halted these processes and the military was deployed to the northern Aguan region in March of 2010 to pressure campesinos.  In November, in the days following the November 15 massacre, the military occupied the National Agrarian Institute office in the Aguan and reportedly removed land titles and other important documentation.

NO END IN SIGHT
There is no end in sight to the repression being systematically used by the illegitimate, post-coup regime.  These brutal killings and attacks are the predictable and inevitable result of the June 2009 military coup.

Obviously, the Honduran regime, the economic elites, military and police must be held accountable for these abuses.

However, the governments of the US and Canada must also be held partially responsible.  Even as Honduras has been suspended from the Organization of American States since the coup, even as most Latin American governments refuse to recognize the legitimacy of the illegitimate and repressive regime in place in Honduras, the governments of the US and Canada are working the hardest to militarily and economically support and politically legitimize this very regime.

WHAT TO DO
Rights Action asks that Americans and Canadians send this information, with your own letters, to your own senators, congress members and parliamentarians, insisting that they do every thing they can to ensure that the US and Canada suspend military and economic relations with the Honduran regime and demand full legal accountability for the massacre of the 5 campesinos in Aguan, the December 15 attack in Zacate Grande and all cases of State sponsored or tolerated repression.

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US OFFICIALS & POLITICIANS

White House: http://www.whitehouse.gov/CONTACT/, 202-456-1111, Comment Line: 202-456-1414

US Congress: Go to http://www.house.gov/ to get contact info for your congress members.  202-224-3121.

US Senate: Go to http://www.senate.gov/ to get contact info for your senator. 202-224-3121.

State Department: 202 647-8947.

State Department, Office of Western Hemisphere Affairs: (202) 647-0834, WHAAsstSecty@State.Gov

Ambassador Craig Kelly, Principal Deputy Asst. Secretary, Western Office of Hemisphere Affairs: KellyC@state.gov

Maria Otero, Under Secretary for Democracy and Global Affairs; c/o Laura Pena, Assistant: PenaL@state.gov

Ambassador Hugo Llorens, U.S. Embassy, Honduras, LlorensH@state.gov

Benjamin Gedan, Honduras Desk Officer, (202) 647-3482

Dr. Arturo Valenzuela: ValenzuelaAA@state.gov

Paul Monteiro, Office of Public Engagement, Darron_P._Monteiro@who.eop.gov

CANADIAN OFFICIALS & POLITICIANS

Prime Minister Stephen Harper
harpes@parl.gc.ca

Minister of Foreign Affairs Lawrence Cannon
509-S Centre Block, House of Commons, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0A6
cannol@parl.gc.ca

Minister of State of Foreign Affairs (Americas) Peter Kent
125 Sussex Dr, Ottawa, ON, K1A 0G2
(613) 992-0253, kent.p@parl.gc.ca

Gilles Duceppe, leader, Bloc Quebecois
1200 Papineau Av, #350, Montreal, QC, H2K 4R5
ducepg@parl.gc.ca

Jack Layton, leader, New Democratic Party
221 Broadview Ave, Suite 100, Toronto, ON, MM 2G3
laytoj@parl.gc.ca

Elizabeth May, leader, Green Party
Saanich Gulf Islands EDA, PO Box 20076, Sidney, BC, V8L 5C9
emaytowin@greenparty.ca

Michael Ignatieff, leader, Liberal Party
656 The Queensway, Etobicoke, ON, M8Y 1K7
ignatm@parl.gc.ca

Bob Rae, Liberal, Foreign Affairs Critic
(613) 992-5234, RaeB@parl.gc.ca

Francine Lalonde, Bloc Quebecois, Foreign Affairs Critic
(613) 995-6327, LalonF@parl.gc.ca

Paul Dewar, NDP, Foreign Affairs Critic
1306 Wellington St. W, Ottawa, Ontario, K1Y 3B2
dewarp@parl.gc.ca, 613-946-8682

Kevin Sorenson, Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, Room 518, Justice Building, Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6
(613) 947-4608, SorenK@parl.gc.ca, 613-992-2971

Dean Allison, Foreign Affairs Committee Chairperson, 4994 King Street, Beamsville, Ontario, L0R 1B0
allison.d@parl.gc.ca, 905-995-2772

Kate Stefanuk, Acting Director (& responsible for Honduras)
kate.stefanuk@acdi-cida.gc.ca

CONTACT YOUR MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT:  http://www2.parl.gc.ca/Parlinfo/Compilations/HouseOfCommons/MemberByPostalCode.aspx?Menu=HOC

CANADIAN Embassy in Costa Rica (responsible for Honduras, as well)
Ambassador Neil Reeder
(506) 2242-4400, (506) 2242-4411 - Political, sjcra@international.gc.ca
Honduras Office of the Canadian Embassy
Centro Financiero Banexpo - Tercer Piso
Boulevard San Juan Bosco, Colonia Payaquí
Tegucigalpa, Honduras
(504) 232-4551; tglpa@international.gc.ca

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GIVE THE GIFT OF
STRUGGLING & WORKING FOR
GLOBAL EQUALITY, JUSTICE & BALANCE WITH MOTHER NATURE

TAX-DEDUCTIBLE DONATIONS
To make a tax-deductible donation for humanitarian relief work in these campesino communities in Honduras, make check payable to "Rights Action" and mail to:

UNITED STATES:  Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
CANADA:  552 - 351 Queen St. E, Toronto ON, M5A-1T8

CREDIT-CARD DONATIONS: http://rightsaction.org/contributions.htm; or go to: www.rightsaction.org.  (Credit card donations can be done anonymously)
FOR DONATION OF STOCK:  contact info@rightsaction.org.  (Stock donations can be done anonymously - have your stockbroker contact info@rightsaction.org)

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Thank-you for your commitment and financial support.  Please send up your questions and comments.

Annie Bird, co-director, 1-202-680-3002, annie@rightsaction.org
Grahame Russell, co-director, 1-860-352-2448, info@rightsaction.org

& Karen Spring (in Honduras), spring.kj@gmail.com