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CEHPRODEC executive director Donald Hernández: “We go to the territories accompanied by organizations such as PBI”

By
Brent Patterson
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PBI-Honduras has accompanied the Honduran Center for the Promotion of Community Development (CEHPRODEC) since May 2014.

Spanish RTVE radio-television recently interviewed Donald Hernández, the executive director of CEHPRODEC.

Below is an excerpt from that full interview.

QUESTION: Have you ever suffered threats?

ANSWER: Yes, many. The activism in which we develop leads us to be permanently threatened. They are direct threats from powerful groups that see their economic interests affected by the actions we develop with activists in the field.

Q: Do you take any measures to protect yourselves?

A: Institutionally we are careful and we follow protocols. We go to the territories accompanied by organizations such as Peace Brigades International. Their vests and visibility allow us to be under their umbrella. Imagine how we have lost our dignity. Because I am Honduran, my life does not deserve respect, I am only respected when I am with someone whose ambassador is watching over me. We have also learned to have very direct relations with the UN High Commissioner’s Office. And when they are dangerous places, we have officials accompany us or we request the visit of ambassadors so that there is more visibility of the vulnerable people who are day by day facing these groups of power.

Q: When you talk about indigenous peoples and native peoples, which ones are you referring to?

A: CEHPRODEC works with the Lenca population in the department of La Paz, with the Tolupanes in the municipality of Yoro and with the Pech population in Olancho.

Q: What are the main demands of these native peoples and of the peasants that you also defend from your organization?

A: There are three important things. One is information. This is understood because in Honduras information is vetoed, we do not have access to public information. The government, so far, refuses to sign the Escazú Agreement, which would oblige us to provide public information, mainly on environmental issues. If we do not have information, then there is a lot of speculation. People ask us for information.

Q: There were three important things you were asked for. Information is the first one, and the other two?

A: Once we had the information with the number of hectares granted in the concession – whether for mining, hydroelectric or other projects – we began to provide training. And then we start organizing. We must have the capacity to accompany the leaders with lawyers, because they are going to need them. We must have the capacity to move them within 24 hours the day they are threatened with death and have to be taken out of the country.

Besides, we study the environmental regulations to be able to contribute in the presentation of unconstitutionality appeals on the Mining Law, the Forestry Law… on all those contributions that we make with the peasants and indigenous people to ensure that their rights are respected.

To read the full interview, go to Entrevista – Donald Hernández, abogado de indígenas y campesinos: “Nadie quiere ser líder porque te persiguen y te matan” (RTVE, February 26, 2024).

Further reading: CEHPRODEC lawyer Donald Hernández: “For those whose lands are stolen and poisoned by mining companies, Canada is synonymous with mining” (October 19, 2022).

PBI-Colombia accompanies the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó at the commemoration of the Massacre of Mulatos and La Resbalosa

By
Brent Patterson
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PBI-Colombia has posted: “PBI Colombia accompanied the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó in the community work and the commemoration of the Massacre of Mulatos and La Resbalosa, perpetrated on February 21, 2005, by the Army. Hearings on this event are currently underway at the JEP with case 04.”

The Massacre

PBI-Colombia has previously explained: “On February 21, 2005, the villages of Mulatos and La Resbalosa (Antioquia), located five hours from La Holandita, the main settlement of the Peace Community, were the scene of a heinous crime that, once again, hit its inhabitants.”

“Among the 8 victims of this massacre, 7 were members of the Peace Community: Luis Eduardo Guerra, historical leader and founder of the Community, Bellanira Areiza, his companion and Deiner Andrés Guerra, his 11-year-old son; Alfonso Bolívar Tuberquia Graciano, the coordinator of the Humanitarian Zone of La Resbalosa, Sandra Milena Muñoz Posso, his wife, Natalia and Santiago, their two children aged 5 years and 20 months.”

“The massacre was perpetrated by a commando of around 60 paramilitaries from the Heroes of Tolová Bloc of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) along with troops attached to the Army’s 17th Brigade.”

That article adds: “In the months following the massacre, the XVII Brigade and the Ministry of Defense stated that, given the modus operandi employed, there was no doubt that the massacre had been perpetrated by the FARC-EP guerrilla group.”

The Peace Community

For Peace Presence explains: “In the middle of the 1990s, as violence escalated and peasant farmers suffered from extrajudicial deaths at the hands of armed actors as well as forced displacements, the people began to organize themselves in order to return to their land and to escape from the spiral of violence.”

It adds: “Conscientiously objecting to the war and demanding their rights as civilians not to be involved in a conflict, the community denounced the use of arms within their territories and committed to a variety of principles in the process (including cooperative communal work, prohibition of alcohol, the non-use of illicit drugs, the no-entry of armed actors, non-use of weapons and the refusal to provide information to armed actors).”

JEP Case 04

The Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP) has noted: “The JEP opened case 04, through Order 040, on September 11, 2018.”

“This case prioritizes the territorial situation based on the facts of the conflict occurred in the Urabá region between 1986 and 2016. This is one of the three territorial cases that the JEP has opened along with that of the Norte del Cauca, the south of Valle del Cauca, and the municipalities of Barbacoas, Ricaurte and Tumaco in Nariño.”

It adds: “To date, members of the 5th, 34th and 57th Fronts of the Jose Maria Cordoba Bloc of the FARC-EP and their respective Fronts have appeared in Case 04 mobile units, as well as members of the XVII Brigade of the National Army.”

PBI-Colombia has previously noted: “In an appeal to the JEP, [the Peace Community] asked that the case be returned to the ordinary courts. The Peace Community does not agree that the massacre is treated as a fact of the armed conflict, since it considers that it occurred in the context of the persecution against the community for having declared itself neutral in the face of the armed conflict.”

Accompaniment

The Peace Brigades International-Colombia Project has accompanied the Peace Community of San José de Apartadó since 1999.

PBI-Guatemala accompanies Conavigua at commemoration of Indigenous Maya victims of the internal armed conflict

By
Brent Patterson
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On February 24, PBI-Guatemala posted:

“PBI accompanies in the framework of the Day of the Dignification of the Victims of the IAC [internal armed conflict] commemorated every February 25 by the delivery of the Report of the Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH) in the year 1999, Conavigua Guatemala invited to a forum and presentation of a documentary.

The forum was dedicated to the CEH Guatemala Memory of Silence Report, presented 25 years ago, which collects testimonies about more than 7,500 cases of human rights violations during the conflict. The commission was created by one of the Peace Agreements with the purposes of “clarifying human rights violations and acts of violence that have caused suffering to the Guatemalan people”; investigate the causes of the conflict and make recommendations “for peace and national accord in Guatemala”. One of the commissioners, Otilia Lux de Cotí, shared a summary and key moments of the report’s preparation and insisted on using her recommendations “to build a democratic and inclusive Guatemala.”

Following the Collective Divergence and the Community of Mayan Studies Ixb’alamkyej Junajpu Wunaq (CEMIJW) presented a documentary that was dedicated to a discussion between Mayan scholars Aura Cumes, Edgar Esquit and Kaypa’ Tz’iken on Maya Memory and Resistance 500 years from the invasion.

The event closed with a music concert from the Tujaal Rock group.”

CONAVIGUA

CONAVIGUA is a women’s organization that fights for the individual and collective rights of Mayan women and indigenous peoples.

Ottawa-based InterPares further explains: “Since 1988, CONAVIGUA (Coordinadora Nacional de Viudas de Guatemala, National Coordination of Widows of Guatemala) has been working with local groups of widows to obtain justice and reparations for their family members killed or disappeared during the armed conflict. Present in seven departments of Guatemala, CONAVIGUA has been actively promoting the implementation of the peace accords in Guatemala by denouncing militarization and by promoting gender equality and human rights. In response to the evolution of their member’s reality, CONAVIGUA is increasingly working around the defense of indigenous land against transnational development projects.”

Historical background

The International Center for Transitional Justice provides this overview:

“From 1960–1996, the nation of Guatemala was ravaged by a bloody civil war. The primary parties to the conflict were the authoritarian government and the rebel, leftist Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unit (URNG), led by the ethnic minority Mayan indigenous people and Ladino peasants.

The worst violence occurred in the 1980s under the governments of General Romeo Lucas Garcia from 1978–1982, General Efraín Ríos Montt from 1982–1983, and General Mejía Victores from 1983–1986. This period of intensive counter-insurgency saw massacres and “scorched-earth” tactics executed throughout the nation.

On June 23, 1994, the Guatemalan government and the URNG signed an agreement to create the Commission to Clarify Past Human Rights Violations and Acts of Violence that Caused the Guatemalan Population to Suffer.

Guatemala’s Commission for Historical Clarification (CEH) was established during the peace process as a conduit for truth seeking and reconciliation across the nation. Like most truth commissions, the CEH began with the signing of a peace agreement and from there embarked on an obstacle-ridden path to the truth.

On February 25, 1999, after two six-month extensions, the CEH released its final report.”

The CEH report

The United Nations-backed Commission for Historical Clarification determined that the Guatemalan military was responsible for 93 per cent of the atrocities – including forced disappearances, massacres and torture – and that 83 per cent of the victims were Indigenous Maya peoples.

The Commission concluded that acts of genocide occurred during the war.

The internal armed conflict killed an estimated 200,000 people and displaced more than one million people between 1960 and 1996.

45,000 people are still unaccounted, including 5,000 children.

Israel’s role in the genocide

NACLA has highlighted: “Israeli press reported that 300 Israeli advisors helped execute the [March 1982 military coup that brought General Efraín Ríos Montt to power]… Through the height of la violencia (“the violence”) or desencarnacíon (“loss of flesh, loss of being”), between the late 1970s to early 1980s, Israel assisted every facet of attack on the Guatemalan people. Largely taking over for the United States on the ground in Guatemala (with Washington retaining its role as paymaster, while also maintaining a crucial presence in the country), Israel had become the successive governments’ main provider of counterinsurgency training, light and heavy arsenals of weaponry, aircraft, state-of-the-art intelligence technology and infrastructure, and other vital assistance.”

Rosa De Ferrari has also noted in the University of Pittsburgh publication Panoramas: “Five years before Rios Montt’s coup, in 1977, the U.S. cut off military aid to Guatemala based on human rights violations committed by the military. In a move that many saw as becoming a proxy for the U.S., Israel began arm sales to the Guatemalan government. By the 1980s Israel had become the largest supplier of weapons, military training, and surveillance technology to Guatemala.”

PBI-Guatemala has also posted this poster of a “march for dignity” happening today.

Meet German Romero on Monday!

By
Brent Patterson
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German Romero Sánchez is a Bogotá-based lawyer with the Associated Network of Human Rights Defenders (dhColombia) that PBI-Colombia has accompanied since 2016. To meet him this Monday February 26, register here.

His organization is made up of an interdisciplinary group of professionals, who assume the defence of victims of human rights violations, either individually or collectively. Its work focuses on litigation actions and legal defence in cases of attacks on unions, campesino leaders, political opponents, and Indigenous communities.

German represents victims of serious human rights violations and emblematic crimes against humanity perpetrated mainly by state security forces.

As a result of his work, he has experienced threats, theft of sensitive information, attacks, surveillance against him and his family, defamation and stigmatization statements by the highest representatives of previous governments.

You can meet him on Monday February 26 at 2 pm ET as he speaks about the importance of accompaniment and the need for PBI field volunteers to accompany him and other threatened organizations, defenders and communities.

Marie Zeller, a former PBI-Colombia field volunteer, will further highlight the crucial role of PBI’s accompaniment. The webinar will be moderated by Sophie Kerridge, also a former PBI-Colombia field volunteer, now a lawyer in London, UK.

Register now here.

Global Affairs Canada provides $450,352.00 to CADSI, UN Special Rapporteurs note arms companies have human rights obligations

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: Protest outside the CADSI office in Ottawa on February 13, 2024.

The website of the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying of Canada shows that the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries (CADSI) has received $450,352.00 from Global Affairs Canada (GAC) over the past two years.

That same Lobbying Commissioner website notes that the role of CADSI is “to convince government officials to maintain and/or improve global market access for Canadian firms in a way that respects Canada’s export controls.”

Citing those export controls, namely the Export and Import Permits Act, three Toronto-based legal scholars argue that “because the ICJ [International Court of Justice] found a serious risk of genocide in Gaza, continuing to export arms to Israel would be illegal.”

CADSI, as “the national voice” representing arms companies in Canada has not publicly commented on the calls for a ceasefire, the International Court of Justice ruling that it is “plausible that Israel’s acts could amount to genocide” in Gaza, or the obligations of companies vis-à-vis the Genocide Convention and the Arms Trade Treaty.

Who does CADSI represent?

CADSI describes itself as “the bridge between government and industry.” Among the companies CADSI represents: BAE Systems, Bell Textron, Boeing, Colt, Elbit Systems, General Dynamics, L3 Harris, Leonardo, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and Rheinmetall among others.

Photo: Protest at Lockheed Martin plant in Ottawa, November 10, 2023.

The Oakland, California-based American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Action Center on Corporate Accountability has noted that these same companies that CADSI represents are profiting from Israel’s 2023-2024 attacks on Gaza.

These companies are among the most profitable weapons companies in the world.

For example, Lockheed Martin’s gross profit for the twelve months ending September 30, 2023, was $8.486 billion. General Dynamics’ gross profit for that same period was $6.580 billion.

CADSI membership for companies with 500+ employees is $10,600. a year. The fee for “small” companies with 5-99 employees is $2,650. a year.

It’s unclear why a lobby group that represents “700+” companies, including billion-dollar transnational corporations, needs a public subsidy to undertake its work.

“No follow-up” by the CCC

The Canadian Commercial Corporation (CCC) is also a member of CADSI. The CCC says as “the only Canadian agency that offers international contracting expertise, we have facilitated the delivery of billions in Canadian products and services to national, state, and municipal governments around the world using G2G contracts.”

Photo: Canadian Commercial Corporation​, 350 Albert Street, Suite 700, Ottawa.

Notably, journalist David Pugliese has previously reported in the National Post: “The Canadian Commercial Corporation acknowledges it conducts no follow-up to ensure exported Canadian-built equipment isn’t being used to abuse human rights.”

The CCC is listed as an exhibitor at CANSEC 2024 at Booths 225/M18/M17.

The CANSEC weapons show

CADSI organizes CANSEC, “Canada’s leading defence, security & emerging technology event”.

CADSI further notes: “CANSEC has always been a great success, and CANSEC 2024 will once again showcase leading-edge technologies, products and services for land-based, naval, aerospace and joint forces military units.”

Video: “Made in Israel, tested in Palestine.” The Israeli weapons company Elbit Systems, which is a CADSI member, will be an exhibitor at CANSEC this year (Booth 1421).

This year’s CANSEC will take place on May 29-30 at the EY Centre in Ottawa.

Notably, while Global Affairs Canada: Trade Commissioner Service was listed last month as an exhibitor at CANSEC, at Booth 225-S, they can no longer be found on the current listing.

The Global Affairs Canada logo, however, still remains on the CADSI website as a “partner” for its presence at the Eurosatory arms show in Paris (happening in June 2024) and the DSEI UK arms show in London (September 2025).

Arms companies have obligations

A recent statement on the need to stop weapons exports to Israel signed by United Nations Special Rapporteurs, Independent Experts and working group members highlights: “Arms companies contributing to the production and transfer of arms to Israel and businesses investing in those companies bear their own responsibility to respect human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law. They have not publicly demonstrated the heightened human rights due diligence required of them and accordingly risk complicity in violations.”

The Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights includes: “The responsibility to respect human rights is a global standard of expected conduct for all business enterprises wherever they operate. It exists independently of States’ abilities and/or willingness to fulfil their own human rights obligations, and does not diminish those obligations. And it exists over and above compliance with national laws and regulations protecting human rights.”

Amnesty International explains: “In relation to the defence sector, this means companies must assess and address human rights risks and abuses arising in all aspects of their business, including how clients such as national armies and police forces use their weaponry and related services. …Major industry players including Airbus, BAE Systems and Raytheon [all CADSI members] are not undertaking adequate human rights due diligence which could prevent their products from being used in potential human rights violations and war crimes.”

Significantly for CADSI, the CANSEC list of exhibitors still includes “Israel Representatives” at Booth M7 and Elbit Systems at Booth 1421 at the EY Centre where there will be “600+ VIPS, generals, top military & government officials”, “50+ international delegations”, and “74% of [the 12,000+] attendees have purchasing power”.

We continue to follow this.

For more on the planned mobilization against the CANSEC arms show on May 29-30 this year, see this World Beyond War Canada webpage.

Photo: Protest at CANSEC 2023.

UN Special Rapporteurs say any transfer of weapons to Israel is likely to violate international humanitarian law

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo: Francesca Albanese, Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967.

Thirteen United Nations Special Rapporteurs, including Francesca Albanese, along with several Independent Experts and Working Group members, have stated that “any transfer of weapons or ammunition to Israel that would be used in Gaza is likely to violate international humanitarian law and must cease immediately.”

Their statement has also been endorsed by Mary Lawlor, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, and David R. Boyd, the Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment.

The Special Rapporteurs highlight: “The United States and Germany are by far the largest arms exporters and shipments have increased since 7 October 2023. Other military exporters include France, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.”

$28.5 million in new permits

Two weeks ago, Alex Cosh of The Maple reported: “The Trudeau government authorized at least $28.5 million of new permits for military exports to Israel during the first two months of the state’s brutal war on Gaza, data supplied to The Maple by Global Affairs Canada (GAC) shows. The total value of the new permits authorized over a two-month period exceeds the 30-year annual record high of $26 million in Canadian military exports to Israel in 2021.”

That article adds: “The permits appear to have been authorized quickly, with one processed within four days of the application being submitted. In its 2022 report on military exports, GAC said that its target processing time was 10 days for ‘low-risk’ destinations, and 40 days for other destinations.”

Is Canada still exporting “military goods” to Israel?

Yesterday, the National Post reported: “Canada has stopped issuing export permits to companies looking to sell military equipment to Israel, according to one person familiar with the matter. The source says that Mélanie Joly’s office has issued instructions to staff at Global Affairs Canada to delay issuing permits that are required for weapons, firearms and components that could have a military use.”

It then notes: “Joly may be starting to feel the heat from her own lawyers. Earlier this month, Nicaragua said that it will take Canada, the U.K., Germany and the Netherlands (which only recently stopped supplying arms) to the International Court of Justice over the Gaza war, claiming that the four countries have violated the Genocide Convention by supplying ammunition and technology to Israel.”

World Beyond War Canada has commented: “Good news if true, but frankly we’re not convinced. And if it is, let’s still be clear that a temporary, secretive, unconfirmed pause on new permits is NOT an arms embargo. We expect the 100s of existing permits to be canceled, including the record breaking amount issued Oct-Dec.”

Tweet by Alex Cosh, News Editor, The Maple (February 23).

The Netherlands and F-35 parts

The Special Rapporteurs also “welcomed the decision of a Dutch appeals court on 12 February 2024 ordering the Netherlands to halt the export of F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel.”

Canada has not taken similar action.

A study commissioned by Lockheed Martin in 2018 said there are US$2.3-million worth of Canadian components in every F-35 fighter jet.

Arms companies have human rights obligations

The UN Special Rapporteurs also say: “Arms companies contributing to the production and transfer of arms to Israel and businesses investing in those companies bear their own responsibility to respect human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law. They have not publicly demonstrated the heightened human rights due diligence required of them and accordingly risk complicity in violations.”

CADSI

Most of the biggest arms companies – including Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and Boeing – that do export weapons to Israel are represented in Canada by the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries (CADSI) located at 251 Laurier Avenue West in Ottawa.

Photo: Protest at CADSI, February 13, 2024.

It does not appear that CADSI has publicly commented on the calls for a ceasefire or for an arms embargo on Israel, nor has not noted the International Court of Justice ruling on the plausibility of a genocide happening in Gaza, or highlighted the necessity of all states (and corporations) adhering to the Genocide Convention.

Last year CADSI received $208,600. from Global Affairs Canada. In 2022 it received another $241,752. with the likelihood of more this year.

Photo: Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying of Canada.

Trade Commissioner Service not at CANSEC?

CADSI is also organizing the annual CANSEC arms show that will take place this coming May 29-30 at the EY Centre in Ottawa.

Along with Lockheed Martin, Boeing and General Dynamics, other exhibitors include Elbit Systems (a CADSI member that provides up to 85 percent of the land-based equipment procured by the Israeli military and about 85 percent of its drones), “Israel Representatives”, and the Canadian Commercial Corporation, a Crown corporation that helps “forge commercial contracts between Canadian businesses and foreign governments”.

CANSEC list of exhibitors, January 18, 2024.

Significantly, the Global Affairs Canada Trade Commissioner Service (that “helps Canadian companies and organizations of all sizes grow and operate internationally”) had been listed as a CANSEC exhibitor this year, but is no longer there.

We continue to follow this.

Will COP16 in Colombia help to protect environmental defenders or be a “colonial conservation rebrand”?

By
Brent Patterson
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Susana Muhamad, Colombia’s environment minister who is expected to be the COP16 Biodiversity Conference president, tells The Guardian: “Although the climate is affecting biodiversity, nature is an answer to the climate crisis.”

She adds: “It is not the only answer, but it is a very important pillar, and we want to position it very strongly to build towards COP30 in Brazil.”

Following the United Nations COP15 Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, Canada in December 2022, COP16 will be held in Cali, Colombia this year over the 12-day period of Monday October 21 to Friday November 1.

The final text from Montreal – known as the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework – that emerged from COP15 included Target 22 with the brief phrase: “ensure the full protection of environmental human rights defenders”.

There is some cautious hope that COP16 in Cali could improve on that language.

And as Muhamad notes, gains seen at COP16 Biodiversity Conference could contribute to strengthening the outcomes of the COP30 Climate Conference that will be held on November 10-21, 2025, in Belém do Pará, Brazil.

Colombia and Brazil are the two deadliest countries for defenders.

In September 2023, Global Witness documented that 60 defenders had been killed in Colombia in 2022 along with another 34 defenders killed in Brazil.

Thirty-six per cent of the 177 defenders killed in 2022 were Indigenous despite Indigenous peoples comprising about 5 per cent of the global population.

Concerns about the 30×30 initiative

Along with the hope that the final text from COP16 could better articulate the protection needs of defenders, there is also the concern that the 30×30 initiative that is part of it could see increased dangers and criminalization for Indigenous peoples and defenders.

More than 190 countries – including Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and Canada who are also part of a “high ambition coalition” – have embraced the 30×30 initiative to “protect” at least 30 percent of land, inland water, and coastal and marine areas by 2030.

Muhamad also told The Guardian: “Saving the Amazon is a practical and tangible action. The creation of multinational marine protected areas is a tangible action that has results for the climate and biodiversity.”

Target 3 of the text adopted in Montreal says these areas should be “effectively conserved and managed through ecologically representative, well-connected and equitably governed systems of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures”.

“Protected areas” and conservationism as a land grab

Forty-nine organizations have cautioned: “The Framework’s focus on ‘protected areas’ will likely continue to lead to human rights abuses across the globe.”

The Swift Foundation highlights: “How it’s working right now is a militarized form of conservation. You have guards with guns, people imposing fines, building fences and kicking people out of their traditional lands. And if communities react in defense they are perceived as anti-conservation.”

Similar concerns have been expressed by Amnesty International that describes the risk of “fortress conservation” and Survival International that launched a campaign in April 2021 to stop 30×30 given the threat of it being “the biggest land grab in history”.

Conservation as a gateway to “militarized forms of violence”

José Francisco Cali Tzay, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples who is Maya Kaqchikel from Guatemala, has also warned: “Throughout conservation’s checkered history, we have seen exclusionary conservation as a gateway to human rights abuses and militarized forms of violence.”

Sofia Monsalve and Georgina Catacora-Vargas have further commented: “Governments need to look beyond ‘30 x 30’ and ‘nature-based solutions’ to put human rights at the center of the Global Biodiversity Framework.”

Specifically, Dene land defender Melissa Daniels critiqued the “performative reconciliation” and “colonial conservation rebrand” of COP15 rather than respecting Indigenous sovereignty, rights and title along with the right to free, prior and informed consent.

And while, for example, a 30×30 conservation-backed maritime park on paper might protect the waters off the coast of Buenaventura, not far from Cali, in practice it could also undermine the assertion by the Afro-Colombian community of Bahia Malaga that sees these waters as part of their collectively owned territories.

Looking ahead

Will COP16 address these concerns?

Will COP16 develop language and mechanisms that could then be seen in the Binding Treaty on business and human rights (a 10th session on this is also expected to take place in Geneva in October 2024) and the COP29 (November 11-22, 2024) and COP30 (November 10-21, 2025) climate talks?

At least 1,910 land and environmental defenders on the frontlines of the biodiversity and climate crisis were killed between 2012 and 2022.

Given a defender has been killed approximately every two days over the past ten years, by the time of COP16 that number could be closer to 2,093 defenders.

Along with the physical protection we provide to defenders at risk, we are committed to advocacy strategies that address this risk at its root.

We continue to follow this.

PBI-Canada co-organizing webinar seeking field volunteers for PBI-Colombia, February 26

By
Brent Patterson
-

PBI-Colombia is seeking new field volunteers!

We are working with them and PBI-United Kingdom on a webinar to encourage applications. The deadline to apply is Saturday March 2.

To learn more about this, join us on Monday February 26 to hear Marie Zeller, a former field volunteer, and German Romero, an accompanied human rights lawyer! This webinar will have simultaneous translation in English and Spanish.

To register, click here.

As of this hour, 30 people have registered for this webinar.

Further reading: PBI-Colombia seeks new field volunteers, deadline to apply is March 2

PBI-Canada webinar on Gitxsan and Gitanyow Resistance to Colonial Mega Projects, March 5

By
Brent Patterson
-

On March 5th at 5.30PM PT join us to get an hour-long update on Gitxsan and Gitanyow resistance to heavy industry.

Kolin Sutherland-Wilson, Tara Marsden, Kai Nagata and Maryam Adrangi will share leadership, analysis and movement-building perspective as three new pipelines are proposed, RCMP Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) funding expands, and the post-Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) era continues to unfold.

To register, click here.

PBI-Guatemala accompanies Human Rights Law Firm at trial of Mayan Poqomchi defender Sofia Tot accused of “usurpation”

By
Brent Patterson
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On February 20, PBI-Guatemala posted:

“Yesterday, #PBI accompanied the Human Rights Law Firm at the Cobán Courts Tower, Alta Verapaz, at the beginning of the conclusions of the Sofia Case. Sofia, Mayan Poqomchi woman, is criminalized and accused of usurpation of private property in protected areas and exploiting its resources.

The Public Office and adhesive plaintiffs are calling for between 6 and 8 years in prison for the region’s renowned defender.”

Ruda has explained that Sofía Tot, defender and indigenous authority of Purulhá, Baja Verapaz, is accused of aggravated usurpation.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, a former UN Special Rapporteur on Indigenous Rights, has written that “usurpation” is when “Indigenous peoples become [are charged with being] trespassers or illegal occupants of their own lands.”

ActionAid adds that Tot belongs to the resistance movement for the recovery of the ancestral land of the Mayan Poqomchi people.

They further note: “The activist has always worked in defense of the Sierra de las Minas, affected by mineral extraction concessions. This is despite the fact that 52% of this territory is tropical rainforest. Today, it is heavily affected by deforestation and the pollution of its rivers. According to official information, she is accused of the crime of ‘usurpation of a protected natural area’. Specifically, they point out that by accessing an area where the emblematic quetzal bird lives.”

PBI-Guatemala has accompanied the Human Rights Law Firm (BDH) since 2013.

We continue to follow this.

Photo: Sofía Tot, defender and Indigenous authority of Purulhá, Baja Verapaz. Photo by Rony Morales.

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