2024-09-15 18:52:04
An environmental defender in Honduras was shot and killed on Saturday evening, September 14, in the northeast of the country, one of the most dangerous in the world for environmental activists. A murder was condemned by the authorities, who promised that “verdict” will do. According to the local press, Juan Lopez, 46, was killed while in his car after going to a church in Tocoa, where he lives and where he is a city councilor. Met in 2021 by Agence France-Presse (AFP), he described living in misery since he fought the mining operation installed near his home, in a mountainous and forested area in the northeast of Honduras.
“We condemn the brutal killing of our colleague and environmental leader Juan Lopez in Tocoa. I have ordered all law enforcement agencies to shed light on this tragedy and identify those responsible.”Honduran left-wing leader Xiomara Castro said on X. “Justice for Juan Lopez”he promised. The environmentalist is a member of the government Free Association. His wife, Thelma Peña, indicated, in a brief telephone exchange with AFP, that he had been the target of “Female” leaving a church, where he was not found.
“Anything could happen”
This activist accused the Los Pinares mining group of operating a mine in conditions that harm the Botaderos forest reserve, near Tocoa, 220 kilometers northeast of Tegucigalpa. This reserve has thirty-four streams, with valuable trees and endangered species, and pre-Columbian archaeological deposits.
Juan Lopez told AFP in November 2021 that he had been warned that the same thing would happen to him as Berta Caceres, a famous defender, who was shot dead on March 2, 2016 because she opposed the construction of a hydroelectric dam. in the west of the country. “When we set out to protect the common good in this country, we ran into powerful interests (…). When we leave home, we know that anything can happen, so we don’t come back.”explained the activist, then the father of a 5-year-old girl.
Also, Juan Lopez has recently asked, during a press conference, the resignation of the representatives of the Free Party who appeared in a video, leaked by a special site, negotiating gifts with drug dealers in 2013. This video shows Carlos Zelaya, brother -in- law of Xiomara Castro, who resigned as deputy after admitting that he had participated in the meeting.
The President of the Council of Relatives and Disappeared in Honduras, Bertha Oliva, emphasized that Mr. Lopez “was an extraordinary man, a man among men who gave his life for his people”. “He is a popular intellectual, a colleague committed to social change, to the protection of the common good”Joaquin Mejia, lawyer and human rights defender, his partner in the fight to protect the Guapinol River, told AFP.
According to the report of the NGO Global Witness, Honduras is one of the most dangerous countries for environmental defenders. In 2023, it is in third place in the world for the number of murders of environmental activists, tied with Mexico (18), after Colombia and Brazil. Between 2012 and 2023, 148 environmental activists were killed there.
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