(Fwd) Honduras: Water, Wood, Community Rights ....

["Raquel Isaula" <raquel@rds.org.hn>]

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Date sent:      	Tue, 12 Aug 2003 11:12:40 -0600
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Subject:        	Honduras: Water, Wood, Community Rights ....
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August 9, 2003

HONDURAS:  WATER, WOOD, COMMUNITY RIGHTS AND STATE REPRESSION.

An international delegation, including a Rights Action person,
documents displacement of rural villages, paramilitary and military
violence, government and private sector complicity, death threats and
assassinations of community leaders and environmentalists in Olancho,
Honduras.  (This report was prepared by Brendan O'Neill, ACERCA,
802-598-8373, brendan@asej.org.)

Please re-distribute, publish, etc, citing source.

If you would like to financially support the local activists
organizations involved, or otherwise get involved, contact Rights
Action [info@rightsaction.org, 416-654-2074] and see below.

===

>From July 26-27 a delegation of five social and environmental justice
organizations and representatives from five countries met with
community-based organizations and leaders in the state of Olancho,
Honduras, finding and documenting widespread human rights violations,
massive ecological destruction and accusations of a complicit and
collaborative Honduran government and private sector.

The delegation was invited to observe and document the violent social
and environmental reality in the state of Olancho by COFADEH, the
Committee of Detained and Disappeared Families of Honduras, after
Carlos Arturo Reyes, a Catholic Church representative and leader of
the Environmental Movement of Olancho (MAO) was gunned down in front
of his house in El Rosario, Olancho on July 18, 2003.

The state of Olancho, the largest and perhaps most biodiverse of
Honduras, has seen 4 MAO activists assassinated since June 2001, 
while
a dozen more have survived attempted assassinations, constant
harassment and death threats. The rise in violence in Olancho has
drawn the attention of Amnesty International who, just days before 
the
assassination of Carlos Arturo Reyes, issued an urgent action alert
for his protection and that of other activists being threatened in
Olancho.

Additionally, the ecological destruction of Honduras and violence
against MAO leaders was the source of inspiration for the "March for
Life" that departed the capital of Olancho, Juticalpa, on June 20,
2003 and marched for 6 days onto Tegucigalpa where, on June 26, over
15,000 people converged on the Presidential palace demanding, amongst
other things, a 10 year ban on all logging in the state of Olancho.

One of the Environmental Movement of Olancho's (MAO ) threatened
leaders is liberation theologist Father Andres Tamayo of Salama,
Olancho who told the delegates, "I've learned to live and suffer with
the people of Olancho. Now I have to learn how to die for the people
of Olancho."  MAO has drawn national support over the past few years
particularly since the June, 2001 assassination of Carlos Flores, a
community leader from the village of El Ocotal, in the municipality 
of
Gualaco who opposed the construction of a hydroelectric dam in his
community. The dam is but one small part of a "Mesoamerican regional
integration development project" called the Plan Puebla Panama that
spans from Mexico to Panama and calls for dozens of more 
hydroelectric
dams in the region. 

The hydroelectric dam is currently being built by the Honduran
corporation ENERGISA [receiving international development funding via
the BCIE ? Central American Bank of Economic Integration] inside the
national park "Sierra de Agalta".   The community of El Ocotal met
with the delegation charging that ENERGISA is the "intellectual
author" behind the assassination of Flores. 

The delegation, accompanied by community members of El Ocotal, 
visited
the hydroelectric dam site that is currently under construction,
encountering armed employees of ENERGISA throughout the zone and
observing wide-spread ecological destruction resulting from the
construction of the dam. 

The delegation also met with Gilberto Flores a community leader and
MAO environmentalist who on Monday July 14 had an AK-47 pointed at 
him
from a pick-up truck with tinted windows in front of the Catholic
Church office in Juticalpa, Olancho and claims that if not for the
children that surrounded him he may have been killed.

Delegates also met with former mayor of Gualaco and now MAO activist,
Rafael Ulloa, who has received death threats since, as mayor, he
adamantly opposed the ENERGISA project for both its social and
environmental impacts. 

The International delegation was also invited to visit a nearby
village called Las Delicias in the municipality of San Esteban,
Olancho where 23 families on July 21 and 22 were forcefully displaced
from their homes and farms by Honduran national police forces as
ordered in court by Judge Daniel Arturcio of Catacamas, Olancho. 
Judge
Daniel Arturcio, according to the displaced families, actually
participated in dismantling the 23 homes driving a tractor to knock
the homes down. Delegates saw and photographed the remains of the
homes burnt to the ground and were shown various bruises and injuries
that many of the displaced families claimed were part of the 2 day
violent displacement led by Honduran police forces.

According to the community of Las Delicias, Mrs. Maria Felipe de
Calderon, owner of hundreds of acres of land in the area, was 
recently
awarded official title to the land by Judge Arturcio, yet the 23
families had lived and farmed on the land for over 20 years.
Furthermore, former president of the community organization "Grupos
Los Puntales" Candido Cruz explained to the delegates, with tears
running down his face and balancing on 1 leg and crutches, that Mrs.
Maria Felipe Calderon had hired assassins that had attempted to kill
Candido 4 times for his role in opposing her bid for the land. The
last attempt to kill Mr. Cruz on February 17 left him with no choice
but to amputate his leg after AK-47 gunfire penetrated the driver-
side of his car entering his leg.  Delegates photographed bullet 
holes
in Mr. Cruz's car.

On Sunday morning, July 27 delegates met with Father Osmin Flores in
Catacamas, Olancho and with several community leaders and
environmental activists in the area.  Father Osmin reported that he
had recently received death threats over the phone and in writing as
well as being followed on July 18 by men armed with AK-47 rifles for
his involvement both in opposing the hydroelectric dam in Gualaco as
well as his work with MAO opposing illegal logging in the state of
Olancho. According to MAO 80% of all logging in Olancho is illegal.  

Later that afternoon delegates met with Father Andres Tamayo who
explained that the Honduras forestry agency COHDEFOR was run mainly 
by
individuals who were also involved in the forestry industry in
Honduras. Furthermore, Tamayo explained  that roughly 40% of the
budget for both National and Liberal party candidates in Honduras is
derived from the sale of wood and expressed doubt that anyone from
within these parties nor COHDEFOR would challenge the current 
forestry
practices in Olancho that he says have recently caused 
desertification
in some areas of the state and are contributing to a water crisis for
many communities.

When asked about the role of foreign governments and transnational
corporations in the state of Olancho Tamayo asked, "If the rich
countries of the world were really interested in "reducing poverty"
wouldn't there be some sign that poverty was decreasing with all the
investment over the past 60 years?" Answering his own question with
another Tamayo said, "Might this investment be precisely to maintain
the unjust system exactly how it is?"

***

The delegation was organized by COFADEH (Honduras), Action for
Community and Ecology in the Regions of Central America (ACERCA-
U.S.),
Rights Action (Canada/ U.S./Guatemala), the Center for Economic and
Political Investigation and  Community Action (CIEPAC-Mexico), the
Social Justice Committee of Montreal (Canada) and Maiz (Mexico).
Participants were from France, U.S., Canada, Italy and Mexico and 
were
accompanied by Honduran organizations.

===

RIGHTS ACTION/ DERECHOS EN ACCION
With its main office in Guatemala City, Rights Action is a
tax-charitable organization (in Canada and the United States) that
raises funds for over 50 community development, emergency relief &
human rights projects in Southern Mexico, Central America (mainly
Guatemala & Honduras) and Peru, and educates and advocates about
global development and human rights issues.  Make a TAX-DEDUCTIBLE
DONATION in Canada or the USA for community defense and development
work in Honduras, payable to ?Rights Action?, and mail to USA: 1830
Connecticut Av, NW, Washington DC, 20009, or CANADA: 509 St. Clair 
Av,
W, box73527, Toronto, ON, M6C-1C0.

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