Honduran Development Leads to Death of Indigenous Leader

Honduran and international press have reported the murder of Tomás García, a Lenca leader, on July 14.

The immediate cause: a bullet from the gun of a member of the engineering battalion of the Honduran armed forces.

But it would be too simple to stop the story there. This is a story of exploitation of Honduras' natural resources, and of popular opposition to their destructive effects, largely ignored outside activist media outlets.

The bare outline of the facts, relayed from Radio Resistencia host Félix Molina by Adrienne Pine, starts simply:

Allan García, 17 year-old Lenca boy, was checked in to the Santa Barbara hospital this Monday at 1:00pm, injured by the Honduran military in the community of Río Blanco, Intibucá. The medical diagnosis is that a high-caliber bullet went through his thorax and that he requires urgent medical intervention. He was sent via emergency transfer this afternoon to Hospital Mario Rivas in San Pedro Sula. In the same attack, his father —Tomás García Domínguez, Lenca community organizer—was murdered around noon, also by the army which is guarding the DESA Company of the Chinese state firm SYNOHIDRO, which plans to build a dam on the Gualcarque River against the will of the indigenous community.

The Mexican news outlet El Informador reported that "close to 400,000 indigenous people are opposed to the construction of a dam by a Chinese company". That company, SYNOHIDRO, is well known as the contractor for controversial dams proposed on the Patuca River in Olancho, in eastern Honduras, expected to cause major environmental damage in the Rio Platano Biosphere, and protested by indigenous people in eastern Honduras as prejudicial to their livelihoods.

In April, International Cry posted notice of the beginning of protests by Lenca residents against the Agua Zarca dam, located on the opposite side of the country in southwest Honduras, on what some news reports call the Rio Blanco, more accurately, the Rio Gualcarque. They reported that this project was one of "around 360 newly accepted development concessions in Honduras, 30% of which are on indigenous lands".  The post describes actions taken by the protesters in April to disrupt the attempt to initiate dam construction.

SOA Watch reported in April about how the local Lenca community mobilized, both to lobby the Honduran government to rescind the Agua Zarca project, and to actively block construction efforts on the dam, which was made possible by legislation passed in 2009 during the de facto regime of Roberto Micheletti. SOA Watch quotes an unnamed woman from the community eloquently describing what is at stake in this struggle:

“What we’ve decided as the community of Rio Blanco, together in one voice, is that they withdraw those machines… Because we haven’t given permission for dams to be built. As the community of Rio Blanco, when the Mayor came for a town hall meeting, what we said was No and No. All in one voice, we said No. He got mad and he got up and left. He went to make a decision with those who like money under the table. That’s what they did. And today they have us oppressed. On the land where we harvest corn, beans, rice, yucca, coffee, they have buried the harvest with the dirt that they throw from the machines. Because of this, today, as the Rio Blanco community we have decided that the hydroelectric company will not continue working. We will not leave the blockade until they withdraw the machines. Because we are poor campesinos and there are about 300 children. Where will the children go? We have to pass this piece of land onto our children, each one of them, so that they can survive.”

According to Indian Country Media Network, on May 23 "police forcibly removed the indigenous demonstrators from the area with tear gas and arrests". The next day, Berta Caceres, Director of the organization COPINH (Consejo Cívico de Organizaciones Populares y Indígenas de Honduras) was arrested on what are widely seen as false charges of possession of firearms, charges suspended but not dismissed by a Honduran judge.

This seemed to be an attempt to intimidate the leadership of COPINH. Taken in this context, the death of Tomás García is an escalation from intimidation to deadly force, against indigenous leaders of protests.

Perhaps predictably, Honduran press reports accused the indigenous protesters of initiating the most recent violence. This is a familiar approach in Honduran reporting, presenting protests as illegitimate interference with the rights of property owners, with "destruction of property" raised as justification for fatal violence.

Coverage by El Heraldo was particularly egregious: the Honduran paper largely quoted a press release from the company. Their story goes that "owing to the violent intervention of the demonstrators of COPINH Tomás García died, and Allan García Domínguez also was injured", leaving a bizarre impression that it was the protesters, not the military, who resorted to firing on the crowd.

While the company press release leaves out the details of just who fired the fatal shots, Berta Cáceres explained that as 300 members of the group were protesting, "members of the armed forces who were accompanied by the police" committed the fatal shooting. In contrast, Vos el Soberano describes the demonstration as peaceful, the latest of 106 days of peaceful protests.

COPINH characterizes the protest as an assertion of Lenca sovereignty, "based on Convenio 169 about Indigenous Peoples, our historic memory, and the right to life and to collective rights as original people" of Honduras. Under ILO Convention 169, indigenous people in Honduras expect to be consulted about development projects that will affect them.

ILO 169 was adopted by Honduras in 1995, and while it would be a stretch to say that previous governments were enthusiastic in implementing it, after the 2009 coup indigenous groups experienced marked reversals in progress in asserting rights of consultation as Honduras rapidly expanded exploitation of natural resources. The post-coup congressional development process ran roughshod over environmental protection. Bad deals for energy generation were common. Increases in gold mining were encouraged, destroying the health and environment of rural communities.

Indigenous activists have fought back-- with little notice from mainstream news media internationally.

Perhaps that will change, now that intimidation has turned deadly. But we aren't counting on it.

ebido a la intervención violenta de los manifestantes del Copinh falleció el señor Tomas García, resultando herido también el señor Alan García Domínguez

Leer más en: http://www.elheraldo.hn/Secciones-Principales/Pais/Dos-muertos-y-un-herido-en-protesta
Síganos en: www.facebook.com/diarioelheraldo y @diarioelheraldo en Twitter

Consejo Cívico de Organizaciones Populares e Indígenas de Honduras

Leer más en: http://www.elheraldo.hn/Secciones-Principales/Pais/Dos-muertos-y-un-herido-en-protesta
Síganos en: www.facebook.com/diarioelheraldo y @diarioelheraldo en Twitter

Consejo Cívico de Organizaciones Populares e Indígenas de Honduras

Leer más en: http://www.elheraldo.hn/Secciones-Principales/Pais/Dos-muertos-y-un-herido-en-protesta
Síganos en: www.facebook.com/diarioelheraldo y @diarioelheraldo en Twitter

debido a la intervención violenta de los manifestantes del Copinh falleció el señor Tomas García, resultando herido también el señor Alan García Domínguez

Leer más en: http://www.elheraldo.hn/Secciones-Principales/Pais/Dos-muertos-y-un-herido-en-protesta
Síganos en: www.facebook.com/diarioelheraldo y @diarioelheraldo en Twitter