ASMAC director Isela Gonzalez holds a poster of Rarámuri land defender Julian Carrillo. Join her on Thursday March 11 at 3:30 pm EST for this webinar that will focus on the Indigenous defence of territory against extractivism.

On March 6, Proceso reported on the conviction of the material killers of Rarámuri leader Julián Carrillo Martínez and his son Victor Carrillo Carrillo. It highlights: “There is still a need to know and prosecute the intellectual authors.”

The article further highlights the four mining concessions that were granted on the territory defended by Julian, at least two of which involved Canadian capital.

This civil society statement has also noted: “Three [were] to individuals and the fourth to the mining company Evrim SA de CV, which belongs to the Canadian group [Vancouver-based] Evrim Resources Corp. [now called Orogen Royalties Inc.].”

Amnesty International has stated that a week before he was killed, Julian spoke against a mining concession granted to a Canadian company.

Displacement from Coloradas de la Virgen

The community of Coloradas de la Virgen is located in the municipality of Guadalupe and Calvo in the Sierra Tarahumara region of the state of Chihuahua.

The Sierra Madre Alliance (ASMAC) and the Centre for Women’s Human Rights (CEDEHM) have called for reparations for the people of this community who have been dispossessed of their land through violence.

The Proceso article notes that most families in Coloradas de la Virgen have been displaced. During the trial it was noted that there are currently only two or three families left, where 700 people had lived before.

This displacement has also come because of the constant threats and killings of Indigenous leaders of the region who defend territory against extractivism.

Logging and mining concessions

In 2007, the Secretariat of the Environment and Natural Resources (SEMARNAT) granted permission for logging in Coloradas de la Virgen. Indigenous defenders were able to successfully challenge this licence. In 2015, the Agricultural Court suspended logging permits. Julian Carrillo’s house was set on fire following that decision.

Proceso also reports: “Over the last eight years the Directorate of Mines granted four mining concessions near the communities of Coloradas de la Virgen and Choréachi, on the boundaries of Morelos and Guadalupe and Calvo.”

According to the news report, those are:

– Title 236200, Mesa del Cobre, granted on May 24, 2010 to Humberto Ayub Touché along with Arcadio Fontes Martínez and Artemio Fontes.

– Title 244491, Polo (in Morelos adjoining Coloradas de la Virgen), granted on October 5, 2015 to Lamberto Flores and Filemón Portillo Chávez (which has Canadian capital).

– Title 243086, San Miguel (in Morelos), granted on July 31, 2017 to Lamberto Flores Salazar and Filemón Portillo Chávez (also with Canadian capital).

– Title 246243, Las Estrellas, granted on April 5, 2018.

Proceso reports: “With the accompaniment of Alianza Sierra Madre, the Rarámuri community reported days before Julian’s murder that the court unanimously ruled the review appeal 357/2007-5, which overturned the first-degree ruling issued by the District 5 Agricultural Unitary Court in the city of Chihuahua.”

Webinar with ASMAC on March 11

To learn more, please join ASMAC director Isela Gonzalez on Thursday March 11 at 3:30 pm EST for a webinar that will discuss this situation.

She will discuss the right to territory and natural assets, the right to free, prior and informed consent, the right to reparations for forced displacement, the urgent need to protect Indigenous land defenders who resist extractivism, and the role of Canadian capital.

To register for this webinar, please click here.

Two suspects in the murder of Indigenous Raramuri defender Julian Carrillo and his son Victor were arrested in January 2019.

On February 13 of this year, a court found one of those people guilty.

This evening (March 5), the Sierra Madre Alliance (ASMAC) reports that the second person has also been found guilty of this crime.

ASMAC writes: “Today, a trial court issued a conviction against one of the material perpetrators who participated in the killings of Indigenous peoples’ human rights defender Julián Carrillo Martínez and that of his son Victor Carrillo Carrillo.”

The first person convicted in the crime was sentenced to three years. The sentencing hearing for the second person will be on March 11.

The defence of Indigenous territory against mining

ASMAC adds: “During the issuance of the judgment, the importance of the various testimonies and evidence that allowed the judges to know the context in which the events occurred was highlighted, that is, in the framework of the defence of the land, territory and natural resources of the Indigenous community of Coloradas de la Virgen.”

During a recent virtual meeting with the Canadian Embassy in Mexico, ASMAC director Isela Gonzalez highlighted: “the situation of human rights violations of the indigenous communities that are located in the Sierra Tarahumara region with more than 1,521 mining concessions from transnational companies, among them several are Canadian.”

Thelma Gómez Durán and Patricia Mayorga of Mexicans Against Corruptions and Impunity (MCCI) have highlighted: “If the areas where there is a mining concession are painted red on a map of the Sierra Tarahumara, much of the territory would be scarlet.”

CEDEHM has also documented that at least 38 human rights defenders have been killed in Chihuahua between 1973 and 2019.

Carrillo spoke against a mining concession before he was killed

Graciela Martinez of Amnesty International has written: “[Carrillo was murdered] after expressing his opposition to a mining concession in his community’s territory because of its social and environmental impacts.”

And Kathy Price of AI Canada has noted: “The assassination [of Julian Carrillo] came just a week after he spoke out against the environmental impacts of a mining concession awarded by authorities to a Canadian mining company without the free, prior and informed consent of the Indigenous people whose lands would be impacted.”

ASMAC accompanies the Carrillo family

In its most recent newsletter, ASMAC noted: “ASMAC and the Centre for Women’s Human Rights (CEDEHM) participate as defenders of the Carrillo Carrillo and Carrillo Baldenegro family. Both families have been permanently accompanied by ASMAC staff.”

PBI-Mexico has accompanied ASMAC since 2018.

March 11 webinar with ASMAC on Canadian mining in the Sierra Tarahumara

For more about this, please join Isela on a jointly organized PBI/Amnesty International webinar on Thursday March 11 at 3:30 pm EST. To register, click here. Neftali Reyes of Educa Oaxaca will also be featured on this webinar to speak about the impact of a Vancouver-based mining company on the Zapotec community of San Jose del Progreso.

Photo: The National Guard raided the Apatlaco blockade of the planned aqueduct/river diversion in the early hours of November 23, 2020.

Lodehoy Morelos reports that the People’s Front in Defence of Water and Land – Morelos, Puebla and Tlaxcala (FPDTA-MPT) says the National Water Commission (CONAGUA) has not granted the necessary permits for the construction of an aqueduct and the diversion of water from the Cuautla River to the Huexca thermoelectric plant.

This relates to the PIM (Proyecto Integral Morelos), an energy megaproject that includes a 12-kilometre long aqueduct from the river, the Huexca plant, and a 171-kilometre gas pipeline that crosses three states (Tlaxcala, Puebla and Morelos).

The article adds that the People’s Front pointed out at a media conference the contradiction that: “A report rendered by CONAGUA on October 5, 2020 indicated on that date, there were no permits for the construction of the aqueduct and authorization of the transfer of water” while on the other hand “the Director from the Cuenca Balsas Agency indicated that CONAGUA had already granted all the permits.”

The article furthermore reports that according to an amparo from CONAGUA that as of February 15, 2021 “no permit has been issued for the construction of the aqueduct on the federal zone of the Cuautla River.”

The People’s Front concludes that this proves the illegality of the aqueduct.

On November 23, 2020, PBI-Mexico expressed concern about the eviction carried out by the National Guard of the Apatlaco blockade/camp that had been in place to stop the construction of the aqueduct and the diversion of water from the Cuautla River.

Indigenous Náhuatl activist Samir Flores, a member of the FPDTA-MPT, was killed in February 2019 after receiving death threats for his role in protests against the PIM. Due to their security situation, PBI-Mexico began to accompany the FPDTA-MPT in early 2020.

The megaproject being built by Italian and Spanish companies (including Seville, Spain-based Abengoa) could be operational by the end of this year.

More than 65 people have now registered for a webinar this coming Thursday March 11 at 3:30 pm EST that will feature Isela Gonzalez of the Sierra Madre Alliance (ASMAC) and Neftali Reyes of Educa Oaxaca.

Ailish Morgan-Welden, a PBI-Canada Board member and the National Action Coordinator for Amnesty International-Canada, will be the moderator for this webinar.

Tara Scurr, the Business and Human Rights Campaigner with Amnesty International-Canada, will also be offering an update on Amnesty’s work in Mexico.

To join this webinar, please click here.

The Guardian has reported: “Isela has been threatened more times than she can remember by university-educated men in suits, whose business interests – in logging, mining, agriculture and narcotics – are challenged by her work as director of Alianza Sierra Madre to protect indigenous land rights in Mexico’s western Sierra Madre.”

Neftali is with Educa Oaxaca an organization that accompanies Indigenous communities that have been impacted by the Vancouver-based Fortuna Silver Mines Inc. owned mine in San Jose del Progreso in the southwestern state of Oaxaca.

The webinar will focus on the experience of Indigenous communities with Canadian mining companies in Mexico, the need to uphold the right to free, prior and informed consent, and what we can do in Canada to support these struggles.

To register for this webinar, please click here.

Ailish Morgan-Welden, Tara Scurr