PBI-Honduras accompanies the Municipal Committee at initial hearing for three men accused of killing Guapinol River defender Juan Lopez
PBI-Honduras has posted:
“Today in San Pedro Sula we accompany the Municipal Committee for Defense of Common and Public Property in the initial hearing against the defendants in the case of the murder of #defender Juan Lopez. To achieve #justice for Juan, it is essential that there is an impartial, independent and thorough investigation into what happened.”
COPINH
The Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) has also tweeted:
“The hearing against 3 people involved in the murder of Juan López began.
From COPINH, we are alert to the resolution of the trial and we hope that it is carried out in a diligent, transparent and fair manner.
We reaffirm our demands that the trial reveal the truth behind Juan’s murder and that justice be done.
We demand that the investigation into the murder of Juan López guarantee the protection of his family, the CMDBCP and his legal team, as well as the capture of the masterminds.”
US Ambassador
The US Ambassador to Honduras Laura F. Dogu also tweeted: “We are closely following the progress of the investigation into the murder of environmental defender Juan López. We are encouraged by the progress in the case. We urge that the judicial process be transparent and fair to ensure justice and protect those who defend the environment and human rights in Honduras.”
We continue to follow the X/Twitter accounts of Ambassador-designate Ioanna Sahas Martin and the Embassy of Canada in Costa Rica, Honduras and Nicaragua.
The arrests
Reportar Sin Miedo has reported: “The defendants, Óscar Alexis Guardado Alvarenga, Daniel Antonio Juárez Torres and Lenin Adonis Cruz Munguía, were arrested on October 4 and 5 in Tocoa. According to investigations by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the three participated in the surveillance and planning of the attack that ended López’s life.”
Photo from Reportar Sin Miedo.
After the three were arrested, the Committee stated:
“In the wake of the vile murder of our comrade Juan López on September 14, 2024, the Committee has remained firm in its demand for justice, demanding that all possible lines of investigation be investigated and that a thorough, independent and prompt investigation be carried out with international technical assistance and advice, without the participation of corrupt operators of the local justice system. this, to guarantee the capture and punishment of the material and intellectual authors of the crime who paid and ordered the spilling of the innocent blood of compañero Juan López.”
They also highlighted:
“As a result of our demands and those of our legal team after the murder of our colleague Juan López, we have been victims of threats and surveillance and campaigns of stigmatization and hatred have been directed against us – the same ones that Juan López and other defenders denounced before his murder without having a response from the State.”
The Peace Brigades International-Honduras Project has accompanied Municipal Committee for the Defence of Common and Public Goods of Tocoa (CMDBCPT) processes and Guapinol River defenders since January 2019.
Video still: Juan Lopez.
Additional background on the megaproject
Image from Guapinol Resiste website.
The megaproject has seven components:
ASP and ASP2: “Inversiones Los Pinares received the rights to concessions “ASP” and “ASP2”, 100 hectares each, to dig for iron oxide.” The ASP mining concession was set to expire on January 28, 2024. On October 26, 2023, Inversiones Los Pinares asked for it to be renewed for up to 30 more years.
Thermoelectric plant: “The thermoelectric plant is based on pet coke [petroleum coke], a by-product derived from the oil refining process [that is] ‘highly polluting and harmful to health’.” The power is to be used for the pelletizing plant.
Iron oxide pelletizing plant: “A mining project by the Honduran company Los Inversiones Pinares will produce 800,000 tons of iron oxide pellets in its first year of operation, generating US$190 million in foreign exchange.”
Guapinol River and Ceibita stream concessions: “[The pelletizing plant needs] one hundred gallons of water per minute, consuming 52 million five hundred and sixty thousand gallons of water in a year.”
On August 1, 2018, the community established a Camp in Defence of Water and Life when the tap water in Guapinol turned chocolate brown and thick with muddy sediment after the company started widening a road for the mine.
Arrests, criminalization and judicialization followed.
The struggle to defend the Guapinol River from this megaproject has also taken the lives of Levin Alexander Bonilla (October 27, 2018), Roberto Antonio Argueta Tejada and José Mario Rivera (August 28, 2019), Arnold Joaquín Morazán Erazo (October 13, 2020), Aly Dominguez and Jairo Bonilla (January 7, 2023), Óscar Oquelí Domínguez Ramos (June 15, 2023) and most recently Juan López (September 14, 2024).
EMCO has also specified: “After 8 years of work, Phase 1 of raw iron production as a raw material began in Los Pinares and at the end of 2021 Phase 2 will start to export semi-processed iron to the United States.”
An investigative report by Contra Corriente and Drilled reveals that U.S.-based Nucor maintained a relationship with Inversiones Los Pinares, the company behind a controversial mining megaproject in Honduras, at least until September 30, 2023, despite having claimed to have ended their ties in October 2019.
Photo: A mining company operating at the ‘Botaderos’ National Park, ‘Carlos Escaleras Mejía’, near Guapinol, Honduras. ©OHCHR/Vincent Tremeau.
Further reading: Investigative report details connections between U.S.-based steel producer Nucor and Los Pinares mine in Honduras (PBI-Canada, October 9, 2024).
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