Front Line Defenders Global Analysis report notes threats against Juan Carlos Flores Solís and Miryam Vargas Teutle

Miryam Vargas Teutle and Juan Carlos Flores Solís.

The Front Line Defenders Global Analysis 2022 report notes (on page 39):

“Juan Carlos Flores Solís and Miryam Vargas Teutle, environmental defenders and members of the Frente de Pueblos en Defensa del Agua y de la Tierra de Morelos, Puebla and Tlaxcala (FPDATMPT) in east-central Mexico were targeted with repeated break-ins to their office, death threats and a possible attempted killing in connection with their struggle against mega-projects and the extraction and contamination of water in the region.”

Miryam Vargas Teutle is a Nahua indigenous communicator and woman human rights defender from the Choluteca region. Juan Carlos Flores Solís is a lawyer, human rights defender and former political prisoner.

In April 2022, Front Line Defenders released this Update about their situation. Red TDT also released this Urgent Action.

The Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project has accompanied the FPDTA Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala since 2020.

People’s Front opposes PIM megaproject

The PIM megaproject was built by the Spanish companies Abengoa, Elecnor and Enagas and the Italian company Bonatti.

In December 2021, Enagás and Elecnor sold their ownership of the pipeline to the Sydney, Australia-based Macquarie Group. Macquarie has offices in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary and Vancouver.

The People’s Front has also linked Toronto-based Alamos Gold to the PIM megaproject (its Esperanza Gold Project mine is situated in Morelos). In February 2022, that mine was sold to Vancouver-based Zacatecas Silver.

The call to boycott Bonafont

In February 2022, the Peoples’ Front also posted on their Facebook page this statement that concludes:

“We call on all communities and people who defend the struggles for life and who believe that another world is possible, to mobilize and join the campaign of BOYCOTT the Bonafont company, through calls on social networks, talks, memes, stickers, manifestos, caricatures, graffiti, murals, songs, dances, plays and any possible means, telling people NOT TO BUY AND NOT TO CONSUME Bonafont water.”

Bonafont is owned by Danone, whose water brands include:

45 HRDs killed in Mexico in 2022

In total 45 human rights defenders were killed in Mexico last year.

The Front Line Defenders report adds: “Across Mexico, as recorded by the HRD Memorial, 18 indigenous peoples’ rights defenders were killed because of their work in 2022, including eight in Oaxaca, five in Guerrero, and three in Chihuahua.”

To read Global Analysis 2022, click here.