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PBI-Mexico expresses concern about threats against Nahua defender and FPDTA-MPT member Miryam Vargas Teutle

By
Brent Patterson
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Video still: PBI-Mexico with Miryam Vargas Teutle, December 2023.

PBI-Mexico has posted:

“From @PBI_Mexico we express our concern about the threats against the defender and communicator Miriam Vargas Teutle, member of @fpdtampt [the Peoples Front in Defence of Land and Water in Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala] and Radio Cholollan. We call on the authorities to guarantee their protection and the exercise of their rights.”

PBI-Mexico shared this Article 19 alert that highlights:

“On April 1 and 2, photographs of journalist Miryam Vargas were posted on Facebook pages discrediting her work as a journalist and as a human rights defender. This smear campaign seeks to discredit the work that Miryam has done for many years and that has earned her recognition within and outside her community. In an interview with ARTICLE 19, the communicator and defender reported having received intimidating messages via WhatsApp from local authorities requesting her “right to reply” and stating that the members of the radio station “must pay for the radio space they use”, otherwise it will be taken away. In addition to this, the journalist points out the continuous presence of a patrol car parked in front of her house.

The facts described here occur after Vargas made public a citizen complaint about the alleged dispossession of land by the legal advisor of the local and municipal authorities.

These facts represent information of public relevance for the community and therefore are specially protected speech under Mexican and Inter-American standards of freedom of expression.

Therefore, ARTICLE 19 demands:

-That the Attorney General’s Office of the State of Puebla carry out the necessary investigations to clarify the origin of the cyber-bullying against journalist Miryam Vargas Teutle in order to apply the corresponding sanctions and guarantee the journalist’s right to a life free of violence.

-To the local authorities of Tlaxcalancingo and municipal authorities of Cholula to refrain from any practice that could violate the journalist’s right to freedom of expression and to defend her human rights.

-The Federal Protection Mechanism for Human Rights Defenders and Journalists, of which the journalist is a beneficiary, to apply the necessary measures to guarantee the safety and integrity of Miryam and her colleagues at Cholollan Radio.”

On April 16, Frontline Defenders further noted:

“On 4 April 2025, journalist and WHRD [woman human rights defender] Miryam Vargas Teutle reported receiving intimidating messages and calls by local authorities of San Andrés Cholula, in the state of Puebla, as a reprisal for her community and journalistic work.

The messages and smear campaign against her come after a citizens complaint reported by radio programme Cholollan Radio, linked to a case of land dispossession, potentially involving a legal advisor to these authorities.

Front Line Defenders calls on the Mexican authorities to publicly condemn this intimidation and carry out an immediate, exhaustive and impartial investigation leading to accountability for those responsible.”

They have also noted:

“Miryam Vargas Teutle is a Nahua indigenous communicator and woman human rights defender from the Choluteca region. She is a member of the Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra y el Agua – Morelos, Puebla y Tlaxcala (FPDTA-MPT) where she has been working since 2010 in defence of the territory against the implementation of the energy mega-project Proyecto Integral Morelos. She is also the community journalist of radio program Cholollan Radio.”

Accompaniment

Peace Brigades International has accompanied the Peoples Front in Defence of Land and Water in Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala (FPDTA) since 2020.

PBI-Guatemala observes hearing of former paramilitary members accused of sexual violence against Mayan Achi women

By
Brent Patterson
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PBI-Guatemala has posted:

“On Monday [April 14] PBI observed a hearing in the #MujeresAchí case.

During the hearing, the procedural parties were given the opportunity to present new evidence before beginning with the conclusions. The defense requested the incorporation of new evidence that sought to point out the invalidity of previously presented expert opinions. Finally, the court considered these means of evidence impertinent, among other things, because they did not meet the necessary requirements.

The court set April 24 at 8:30 a.m. for the beginning of the conclusions of the trial.”

CRN Noticias has previously explained: “The defendants [three former members of the Civil Self-Defence Patrols paramilitary force] face charges of sexual violence against more than 30 Mayan women of the Achí people during the 1980s, in the context of the internal armed conflict. [The Prosecutor’s Office has presented evidence] that the defendants sexually abused at least five women. These women were detained for more than 25 days in a military barracks in Rabinal, Baja Verapaz.”

Memoria Virtual has noted that the Civil Self-Defence Patrols (las Patrullas de Autodefensa Civil or PAC) “were paramilitary organizations … organized, armed, supervised, and directed by the military forces … [established] to monitor and defend the villages, to pursue and detect suspects of belonging to the guerrillas and to participate in military actions or punishment of the [mostly Indigenous] population.”

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.

The conflict between state military forces and guerilla combatants was underpinned by the poverty, marginalization and racism against Indigenous peoples.

The United Nations-backed Commission for Historical Clarification established in June 1994 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.

Radio FGER has noted: “The ‘Mujeres Achi’ case is emblematic of sexual violence during the internal armed conflict, evidencing the use of rape as a weapon of war by the Army and paramilitary groups to attack women and subjugate indigenous communities. …Violations in these contexts were particularly degrading, as many victims were abused while in detention, and at times, in front of family members, which intensified their suffering.”

We continue to follow this.

PBI-Canada calls for language in the COP30 text this November that would help protect land and environmental defenders

By
Brent Patterson
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The United Nations COP30 climate change conference will take place on November 10 to 21, 2025, in Belém, Brazil.

An estimated 2,106 land and environmental defenders have been killed around the world between 2012 and 2023.

Once the 2024 and 2025 numbers are known, given the average of 175 defenders killed each year, the total could reach 2,457 by COP30.

Peace Brigades International-Canada supports the call that all State Parties at COP30 should “recognize the link between the climate crisis and growing violence and repression against land and environmental defenders and take meaningful steps to protect defenders and civic space (online and in person) to promote ambition and climate action.”

We further support the call “urging all Parties to commit to the enhanced protection of environmental human rights defenders, including reporting, investigating and seeking accountability and redress for reprisals against environmental human rights defenders, and public information about the actions taken to do so as well as public recognition of the importance of their work.”

And we support the call on world leaders to “stop the violence and criminalization against indigenous peoples, small farmers, small fisherfolk, and other environmental and land defenders. Support the work they do. Respect and listen to our defenders.”

We believe these calls are fully consistent with the United Nations Human Rights Council statement from March 21, 2019, that affirms: “Human rights defenders, including environmental human rights defenders, must be ensured a safe and enabling environment to undertake their work free from hindrance and insecurity, in recognition of their important role in supporting States to fulfil their obligations under the Paris Agreement” to limit global average temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

They are also consistent with Target 22 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework adopted by the Conference of Parities (COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity in December 2022.

Target 22 urges Parties and other Governments to “ensure the full, equitable, inclusive, effective and gender-responsive representation and participation in decision-making, and access to justice and information related to biodiversity by indigenous peoples and local communities, respecting their cultures and their rights over lands, territories, resources, and traditional knowledge, as well as by women and girls, children and youth, and persons with disabilities and ensure the full protection of environmental human rights defenders.”

Despite this, the final text emerging from UN COP climate conferences have never acknowledged land and environmental rights defenders.

At a PBI-Canada convened webinar held in October 2024, Michel Forst, the UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders, commented: “There are people who are willing to push for good results and at the same time we know that we also have people who are not our allies who are pushing also for counter-results and trying to delete paragraphs and good wording that some of us, some of them, would like to introduce.”

PBI-Canada is following the Peoples’ Summit, the Mesoamerican Caravan for the Climate and Life, AntiCOP organizing, and other popular and official initiatives that support protection measures for climate defenders.

We will also be amplifying messages like this one from UN Special Rapporteur Mary Lawlor on the need for defenders to have safe spaces at COP30.

UN Special Rapporteur Lawlor has highlighted: “There is a huge opportunity for #Brazil with #COP30 in Belém this year. The climate COP has historically been a hostile & risky place for HRDs. I am asking the Brazilian authorities to change that tide & make it a safe space where they can participate meaningfully.”

This coming Tuesday November 18, during COP30, we also plan to bring together a United Nations Special Rapporteur and PBI accompanied defenders to talk about the risks and protection needs of those on the frontlines challenging the extractive industries that are accelerating the climate crisis.

You can pre-register for this webinar by clicking here.

Questions and concerns about the pending export of Canadian-made armoured vehicles to the Israel Police

By
Brent Patterson
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Video still of Roshel at CANSEC 2024 on May 29-30, 2024: “Shimonov said the company has a contract with the government of Israel to provide Senator transport vehicles.” – Toronto Star, March 16, 2024.

On March 14, 2024, CBC reported that shortly after October 7, 2023, the Israeli government sent a request to Global Affairs Canada for clearance to import about thirty armoured patrol vehicles from Brampton, Ontario-based Roshel.

At that time, Roshel said in an emailed statement: “It is our understanding that these vehicles are not to be used for military purposes, but solely for domestic police operations. This has been communicated to the government of Canada.”

Then on March 16, 2024, the Toronto Star reported: “[Roshel] says its shipments destined for police use in Israel, not military use in Gaza, have been delayed without explanation by the federal government. …It’s not clear if the company’s plan to supply Israeli police with bulletproof security vehicles is specifically caught by the Trudeau government’s decision to pause exports to Israel of military goods and technology.”

By March 20, 2024, The Maple, referencing the article by CBC News cited above, reported: “In response to a message from The Maple, Roshel CEO Roman Shimonov said the buyer of the vehicles was not Israel’s ministry of defence, but did not say which branch of the Israeli government planned to buy the goods.”

Months later, on August 7, 2024, PressProgress reported: “In a statement to PressProgress, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada said there are no open permits for ‘exports of lethal goods to Israel.’ They did not confirm whether or not armoured vehicles are included within the scope of that term.”

What has happened since then?

The “Our Customers” section of the Roshel website currently lists Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Canadian Commercial Corporation (CCC) among others.

On December 13, 2024, Roshel announced it had opened its first U.S.-based production facility in Shelby Township, Michigan. The company stated: “By establishing this state-of-the-art plant, Roshel is well-positioned to meet the growing demand from U.S. defense and law enforcement agencies, who now constitute the majority of our orders.”

On December 16, 2024, Roshel CEO Shimonov told the Financial Post: “Definitely, [the new production facility outside Detroit] is related to [U.S. president Donald] Trump’s administration and also definitely to potential changes in the way tariffs are working. As of today, we are getting most of our orders from the U.S. government.”

On March 10, 2025, the Markham, Ontario-based Canadian Defence Review, “Canada’s leading defence magazine”, announced that it had named Roshel CEO Shimonov “Canada’s Defence Executive of the Year for 2025”.

That article leads with: “Prior to moving to Canada in 2012, Roman Shimonov had worked in the defence and security sector in Israel. His family immigrated there from the Soviet Union when Shimonov was 12 years old. ‘I served in the Israeli Ground Forces and started my career over there,’ said Shimonov.”

Shimonov further comments: “Our expansion into the United States is not over, plus we are expanding into Europe. We are increasing our product lines and the verticals that we’re acting in. And we are waiting for numerous major contract awards that we are extremely optimistic about this year.”

Human rights concerns

Palestine

Roshel has stated its armoured vehicles would be used for “domestic police operations”, which would include occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

On March 11, 2025, CNN reported: “Mahmoud Muna looked on in disbelief as plain-clothes Israeli police officers rifled the shelves in his decades-old bookstore in occupied East Jerusalem. …Witnesses to the raid said police were looking for any book containing the word ‘Palestine,’ a Palestinian flag, its colors, or any symbol of Palestinian national or political identity.”

The Guardian article on the police raid adds: “The confiscated books included titles on the work of British artist Banksy, and others by the Israeli historian Ilan Pappé and the US academic Noam Chomsky.”

On March 25, 2025, ABC News reported that after “an attack by settlers on local Palestinian families… Palestinian Academy Award-winning filmmaker Hamdan Ballal … the co-director of ‘No Other Land’ was detained by the Israel Police… Israel Police confirmed to ABC News in a statement that Ballal was arrested and taken to Kiryat Arba police station. The force said Ballal was under investigation.”

The New York Times adds: “Despite a handful of high-profile prosecutions, a vast majority of police investigations into attacks by Israelis on Palestinians are closed without charges, according to Yesh Din, an Israeli rights group.”

In July 2024, BBC reported: “The International Court of Justice (ICJ) said Israel should stop settlement activity in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem and end its ‘illegal’ occupation of those areas and the Gaza Strip as soon as possible.”

The Amnesty International 2023/24 report documented: “In the West Bank, Israeli policing operations were the most lethal since 2005, with 110 Palestinian children among those killed. Detentions of Palestinians without charge or trial reached record levels. …Throughout the year, Jenin refugee camp in the north endured Israeli law enforcement operations that killed at least 23 Palestinians between January and July. …[Israel Police have also] imposed bans on anti-war protests in Palestinian communities.”

Israel

On March 20, 2025, the Jerusalem Post reported: “Large protests for the hostages and against the firing of Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) Director Ronen Bar in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv this week were marked by extensive use of police force, including officers punching and kicking protesters and violent dispersals of groups.”

That article adds: “Footage from a Tuesday night protest calling to end the Israel-Hamas War showed multiple instances of police punching and kicking protesters as they attempted to disperse them.”

The United States

While Roshel lists the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection as customers, it has not been documented how Roshel armoured vehicles could be used by these agencies.

On March 1, 2025, The Washington Post reported: “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered about 3,000 active-duty troops to the southern U.S. border, including soldiers from a motorized brigade equipped with 20-ton armored Stryker combat vehicles, defense officials familiar with the effort said.”

That article adds: “Several thousand U.S. troops are already involved, primarily assisting U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in the detection and apprehension of migrants seeking to enter the United States illegally.”

While Stryker combat vehicles are made by General Dynamics Land Systems (GDLS), it signals a context of concern on how other armoured vehicles could be used by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, as well as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Roshel sponsors CANSEC, May 28-29

Roshel is listed by the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries (CADSI) as a sponsor of CANSEC 2025.

Peace Brigades International-Canada is examining the relationship between CANSEC, the arms industry and their impact on the safety and security of human rights defenders, including land and environmental defenders.

Under the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, all companies, including those that produce “military goods”, 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.

Additionally, the legal concepts of “corporate complicity” in and the “aiding and abetting” of international crimes could in the future apply to arms companies that continue supplying weapons in the knowledge that they may be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international human rights or humanitarian law.

We are also following @shut.down.cansec on Instagram.

What implications could Canada-US trade and security talks have on the safety of human rights defenders?

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo of the RCMP on Wet’suwet’en territory by Dan Loan: With the mining of critical minerals, fast-tracked resource projects and energy corridors potentially on the horizon, the controversial RCMP CRU-BC remains positioned as a “national best practice”.

On April 15, Ottawa-based CBC Senior reporter on defence and security Murray Brewster noted: “Talks between Canada and the U.S. on a renewed trade deal are expected to get underway in the first week of May.”

And back on March 28, the CBC had also reported: “The prime minister [Mark Carney] said he and [US President Donald] Trump agreed to sit down and negotiate a comprehensive ‘new’ economic and security relationship between the two countries should Carney win next month’s federal election [on April 28].”

What could the talks include?

Washington-based CBC News correspondent Alexander Panetta has speculated that “a new economic and security arrangement with the United States” could include the US demanding “more market access for [dairy] farmers in Wisconsin”, an end to the “digital services tax, which penalizes U.S. tech giants”, and “new measures to keep Chinese products out of supply chains — from steel to cars”.

Panetta also suggests we should expect US calls “more military spending, and faster, especially in the Arctic”, “ramped-up talk about developing Canada’s critical minerals”, and potentially “ballistic missile defence”.

Energy corridor

Toronto-based CBC Senior Reporter Mark Gollom has also recently highlighted: “Liberal Leader Mark Carney and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre are offering similar sounding energy development plans that would fast-track regulatory processes and create energy corridors to develop natural resource projects. …Both Poilievre and Carney said their plans would help reduce reliance on the U.S, particularly in the wake of the tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump.”

Savanna McGregor, the Grand Chief of the Algonquin Anishinabeg Nation Tribal Council, has written in The Toronto Star: “Speaking for the Algonquin, we would sooner go to court than accept a corridor which fails to meet our needs.”

The RCMP CRU-BC/C-IRG

The BC Supreme Court recently found that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG), now rebranded the Critical Response Unit-British Columbia (CRU-BC), had violated the Charter rights of three Indigenous land defenders resisting the construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline on Wet’suwet’en territory in northern British Columbia.

The RCMP C-IRG is also currently the subject of a “systemic investigation” by the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission (CRCC) to “examine whether relevant policies, procedures, guidelines and training” are “consistent with applicable jurisprudence/case law and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”

Despite this, the issue of this militarized police unit repeatedly used against land and environmental defenders has not emerged in recent media reports about the push for energy corridors, pipelines, the extraction of critical minerals that are likely to encounter Indigenous opposition.

For example, an article published today on calls to reform the RCMP by CBC reporter Catharine Tunney, there is no reference to the C-IRG/CRU-BC.

That article notes that Prime Minister Carney says “I view the RCMP as central to the security of Canadians”, an NDP spokesperson said they “remain committed to strengthening the RCMP’s ability to serve communities effectively and respond to public safety needs”, while the Conservatives did not comment.

Five areas of concern

Five potential areas that could impact the safety and security of human rights defenders, notably Indigenous land defenders in this country:

1- Increased military spending in the Arctic could mean the militarization of Indigenous territories with Arctic military bases and infrastructure (such as radar installations) that could impact human rights, the environment and wildlife.

2- The rapid development of critical minerals, most notably in the Ring of Fire region in northern Ontario, could also impact human rights and the environment, especially if Indigenous land defenders seek to block major extractive projects that they see as lacking consultation and free, prior and informed consent.

3- Increased border militarization, including the continuation of RCMP Black Hawk helicopters patrolling Canada’s southern border with the US could impact the rights of migrants fleeting persecution and rights violations.

4- A closer military/security partnership between Canada and the US would likely undermine the calls for greater transparency on the export of Canadian-manufactured “military goods” to the US, notably the lack of control over those goods being re-exported and used to commit human rights violations.

5- An energy corridor, cutting wait times and fast-track approvals for major resource projects, as well as deeming extractive megaprojects such as pipelines in the “national interest” have the potential to collide with Indigenous rights and could see communities mobilizing to defend their land and waters.

Within these areas of concern is the potential for the continued use or even expansion of the C-IRG/CRU-BC that was described in early-2024 by RCMP senior media relations officer Staff Sergeant Kris Clark as a “national best practice”.

We continue to follow this.

As Canadian company sells mine in Oaxaca, we remember the territorial defenders killed while opposing it

By
Brent Patterson
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Photo by Educa Oaxaca. “March 21, 2012: CPUVO members and Mexican human rights organizations hold a protest in front of the Canadian embassy in Mexico City and at the Canadian Consulate in Oaxaca city to denounce the responsibility of the Fortuna Silver Mines Company in the murders of human rights advocates in San José del Progreso.” – Civilian Observation Mission Report.

Yesterday, April 14, 2025, Vancouver-based Fortuna Mining Corp. announced “the successful completion of the sale of its 100 percent interest in Compañia Minera Cuzcatlan S.A. de C.V. to JRC Ingeniería y Construcción S.A.C., a private Peruvian company…”

The company notes that in the deal: “Fortuna retains a 1.0 percent net smelter royalty on production from the San Jose Mine concessions payable after the first 6.1 million ounces of silver and the first 44,000 ounces of gold or 119,000 gold equivalent ounces have been mined or extracted from the property.”

The mine has a controversial and deadly history.

On February 15, 2012, Dawn Paley reported: “It’s been almost three years since hundreds of people took direct action to temporarily shut down Vancouver-based Fortuna Silver’s gold and silver mine near Oaxaca City, Mexico.”

Paley added in that article: “Three people have been killed so far, most recently, Bernardo Mendez Vasquez, who was shot seven times on January 18, 2012, by a municipal police officer. Locals say municipal authorities ordered the police to attack residents who were refusing to allow a new water system to be installed on their land because they feared it would be used to supply the mine with water.”

Less than two months later, Ottawa-based MiningWatch Canada posted: “On March 15th, Bernardo Vásquez Sánchez, an Indigenous Zapotec community leader and member of the Coordinating Committee of the United Peoples of the Valley of Ocotlán (CPUVO) in San José del Progreso, Oaxaca, was murdered in an ambush by a group of some three gunmen. Bernardo was an outspoken leader against the mining operations of Vancouver-based Fortuna Silver Mines in San José del Progreso, Oaxaca, known locally by the name of its Mexican subsidiary, Minera Cuzcatlán.”

Photo: Bernardo Vásquez Sánchez.

On March 22, 2012, La Jornada reported: “Members of environmental and human rights organizations yesterday symbolically took over the Canadian embassy to protest the murders of Bernardo Méndez Vásquez and Bernardo Vásquez Sánchez who opposed the activities of the Canadian-Mexican mining company Cuzcatlán.”

Photo: Protest at Canadian Embassy in Mexico City.

Just a few months earlier in November 2011, the Peace Brigades International-Mexico Project had commented: “Fortuna Silver is a Canadian company that operates through the Mexican subsidiary Cuzcatlán. Mexican and international organizations report that the company obtained a permit for extraction from local authorities, without informing the community, violating their rights to consultation and to free, prior and informed consent.”

PBI-Mexico highlighted: “Since then, the sector of the community that is against the mine has been subjected to constant attacks, including threats, arbitrary arrests, and campaigns against human rights defenders.”

By November 19-22, 2012, Brent Patterson and Meera Karunananthan, both now with Peace Brigades International-Canada, were part of a three-day international observation mission, accompanied by PBI-Mexico, to examine the situation with the mine. 

Allegations of paramilitary groups

The Civilian Observation Mission Report that was developed after that visit noted:  “The testimonies gathered often report the presence of armed civilians who do not serve as official police. They point out that, beyond the municipal police, there are extra-official paramilitary groups acting as a shock group promoting company interests. This results in a highly confusing environment characterized by impunity in the cases of violation of human rights, and by mining company financing in the municipality.”

In her eulogy for Vasquez, Paley stated: “He was well aware that a paramilitary group was operating in San José Progreso, Oaxaca, and that it was organized to snuff out opposition to a gold mine, owned by Vancouver based Fortuna Silver. … One thing is clear: this was a political hit. Bernardo was murdered because he dared to speak out, ignoring the climate of fear imposed upon his people.”

One year after Bernardo’s murder, the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining (REMA) also stated: “On repeated occasions, members of the CPUVO denounced that the mining company was financing armed groups in the community with the endorsement of the municipal president of San José del Progreso, Alberto Mauro Sánchez.”

Intellectual authors

On the one-year anniversary, the Oaxacan Collective in Defence of Territories demanded “punishment for those materially and intellectually responsible for the murders of Bernardo Vásquez Sánchez and Bernardo Méndez Vásquez, defenders of the territory.”

In March 2016, the Oaxacan Collective in Defense of Territories noted on the fourth anniversary of the murder of Bernardo Vásquez Sánchez: “To this day, the masterminds of Bernardo’s murder have not been investigated. In 2015, the Oaxaca Attorney General’s Office allowed Bartolo Aguilar, Domingo Aguilar, and Albino Hernández, accused of being the material authors of the crime, to be released.

Company denial

In May 2019, Luiz Camargo, the director of finance and general affairs of the Cuzcatlan mine, told Radio-Canada: “The mining company has not and has never had any participation whatsoever in violent acts.”

We continue to follow this.

PBI-Guatemala observes two-day court hearing that grants retired military officer alternative measures in the Emma & Antonio Molina Theissen case

By
Brent Patterson
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On April 10, PBI-Guatemala posted:

“Today PBI observes a hearing in the Molina Theissen case in the First Room of the Court of Appeals. Tried the review of coercion measures requested by Hugo Ramiro Zaldaña Rojas, sentenced in this case for crimes of duties against humanity, forced disappearance of Marco Antonio and aggravated sexual violence against his sister Emma Molina Theissen.

The defense argues humanitarian rights, human rights and health care of the 83-year-old ex-serviceman according to his deficient rating. Zaldaña Rojas is facing substitute measures at the Military Hospital for the sentence issued in 2018 to 58 years in prison.

The MP [Public Ministry], the PGN [the Attorney General’s Office] and the adhesive plaintiffs argued against this request, for several reasons, among them, according to the due process code, the offences of which he is convicted for their severity do not allow a change of sentence; that a change of coercive measures would be against of a resolution of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in this same case; which follows the danger of obstruction of the truth by the fact that the convicted military never disclosed the whereabouts of Marco Antonio, missing from the family home when he was 14.

The First Room convened for tomorrow Friday at 10am to announce its resolution.”

Then on April 11, PBI-Guatemala posted:

“Today PBI observes the resolution hearing on review of coercion measures in Molina Theissen case

Hugo Ramiro Zaldaña, accused of crimes of duties against humanity, enforced disappearance and aggravated sexual violence, requested the modification of coercion measures imposed against him.

The magistrates have considered that the age of the accused, (82 years), his state of health and the absence of the risk of escape, justified the modification of restrictive liberty measures, allowing him telematical control and mobility to his home and health centers.”

Accompaniment

PBI-Guatemala has long followed this case. In April 2016, PBI-Guatemala noted: “This month we observed the Molina Thiessen family press conference.” And in October 2017, PBI-Guatemala further noted: “The Molina Thiessen trial will begin on March 1, 2018.”

Context

The Guardian has previously explained:

“[On September 27, 1981, 21-year-old social and political activist Emma Guadalupe Molina Theissen] was taken for interrogation to a military base in Quetzaltenango, western Guatemala, but refused to collaborate.

She was given electric shocks to the eyelids, was raped by her captors, and deprived of food and water to create sensory disorientation. Emma escaped by slipping through the cell railings because she had lost so much weight.

She fled to Mexico a few weeks later, unaware that her little brother [14-year-old Marco Antonio Molina Theissen] had been taken [on October 6, 1981], most likely in retaliation for her audacious escape.”

Photo: Emma Guadalupe Molina Theissen (left) and her mother Emma Theissen Álvarez de Molina hold a photo of Marco Antonio. 

This past February, NISGUA noted: “On February 6, 2025, an appeal hearing of the 2018 sentence of the Molina Theissen case was held. This sentence sentenced Benedicto Lucas García, Manuel Callejas y Callejas, and Hugo Zaldaña Rojas to 58 years in prison for crimes against humanity, forced disappearance and aggravated sexual violence, as well as Francisco Luis Gordillo Martinez to 36 years in prison for the same crimes. The appeal filed by the defense of the former soldiers seeks to annul this sentence.”

Photo: Francisco Gordillo Martinez, Hugo Ramiro Zaldana, Manuel Antonio Callejas and Edilberto Letona Linares.

On April 11, Prensa Libre further reported:

“The alternate magistrates of the First Chamber of the Court of Appeals of the Criminal Branch of Higher Risk Processes revoked the preventive detention issued against retired military officer Hugo Ramiro Zaldaña Rojas, prosecuted in the Molina Theissen case, under the argument of his current state of health. For this reason, they will enjoy a substitute measure at home, under telematic control.

Although Zaldaña Rojas was convicted in 2018, along with other retired military officers, for the disappearance of Marco Antonio Molina Theissen and the rape of his sister, Emma Guadalupe, events that occurred in 1981, the sentence has not yet become final due to legal appeals filed.

Zaldaña Rojas was sentenced to 58 years in prison for the crimes of duties against humanity, forced disappearance and aggravated sexual violence.

For their part, the lawyers of the Molina Theissen family affirmed that the resolution of the magistrates is “plagued with illegalities,” at the end of the hearing to review coercive measures.”

We continue to follow this.

Excerpt from April 2016 PBI-Guatemala monthly information pack.

Further reading: Marco Antonio Molina Theissen: “Mom, what are they going to do to us?”: Despite the fact that more than 43 years have passed since that day, when two men invaded the residence of the Molina Theissen family, in the capital’s zone 19, his mother Emma remembers exactly the details of the last time she saw Marco Antonio, on October 6, 1981. (eP investiga, April 11, 2025)

PBI-Colombia accompanies Nomadesc as Presidential Advisor for Human Rights visits with threatened union workers

By
Brent Patterson
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PBI-Colombia has posted on Instagram:

“In the context of the visit of the Presidential Advisor for Human Rights, and our accompaniment to Nomadesc, who watch over the fulfillment of the rights of the unions and specifically of the USE, Sintraunicol and Sinaltrainal, we are concerned about the security situation faced by the unions for their work.”

This post refers to the Association for Research and Social Action (Nomadesc), the Presidential Advisor for Human Rights Lourdes Castro, the EMCALI Union of Labor Unions (USE), the National Union of University Workers and Employees of Colombia (SINTRAUNICOL), and the National Union of Food  Workers (Sinaltrainal).

Threats against Colombian unions

A statement shared in February by the National Union of Food  Workers (Sinaltrainal), currently on strike against the Swiss transnational Nestle, demands: “End of harassment and threats: they denounce that the members of the union have received death threats, and demand guarantees for their safety.”

On March 13, the Verifico platform noted: “By means of a pamphlet, signed by the Jaime Martínez Mobile Column of one of the FARC-EP dissidents, the board of directors of the Union of University Workers and Employees of Colombia (Sintraunicol), of the Cali sub-directive, is declared a military target.”

On March 27, Nomadesc posted: “The USE union expresses its commitment to the defense of labor rights, and requests protection for its organizational exercise, its right to representation and association, which today are also at risk.”

The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) documented: “Between 2023 and 2024, 11 trade unionists were assassinated, resulting in Colombia retaining its reputation as the deadliest country in the world for trade unionists.”

Peace Brigades International has accompanied NOMADESC since 2011 and its president Berenice Celeita since 1999.

We continue to follow this situation.

Further reading:

– PBI-Colombia accompanies Nomadesc at meetings with Presidential advisor and SINTRAUNICOL, threatened trade unionists (PBI-Canada, March 28, 2025).

– PBI-Colombia accompanies Nomadesc at meetings with state authorities in Bogota given threats faced by trade union leaders (PBI-Canada, March 14, 2025).

30,000 people mobilize in Ottawa to demand arms embargo following Ploughshares report on GD-OTS-Canada artillery propellant deal

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo: Arms embargo mobilization in Ottawa, April 12. Photo by Adonis Ayoub.

An estimated 30,000 people mobilized in Ottawa this past weekend to demand a two-way arms embargo on Israel.

The CBC reports: “Protesters mobilized on Saturday [April 12] after [the Waterloo, Ontario-based] peace research institute Project Ploughshares released a report saying that Canada approved a new $55-million US permit for ammunition to the U.S. from Quebec-based General Dynamics (GD-OTS-Canada) even though the federal government had committed to stop all arms from reaching Israel.”

The article then explains:

“On Sept. 10, 2024, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly said Canada would bar Canadian-made arms from reaching Gaza and later that month reaffirmed that Canadian-made arms would not be exported to Israel and that arms made for the U.S. would not be sent along to Israel.

But 16 days after Joly’s initial commitment, more money was approved for the U.S. to buy ammunition for Israel from GD-OTS-Canada, according to contract details on www.USAspending, an official open data source. The site shows that on Sept. 26, 2024 a 2023 contract was modified to increase its upper limit by just over $55 million US (around $76 million Cdn). The original contract was to supply the U.S. with ammunition to be used “in support of Ukraine,” but the modification in September changes the language to “in support of Ukraine & Israel.”

Shatha Mahmoud an organizer with the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) said Canadian companies supplying military components — even indirectly — are enabling Israel. “We are continuing to send weapons, if not straight to Israel, then via the U.S. where the majority of these weapons get to Gaza,” she said.

Photo: Shatha Mahmoud. Photo by Faith Greco/CBC.

Global Affairs Canada told CBC it was preparing a comment but couldn’t provide one on short notice over the weekend.”

More from Project Ploughshares

The Project Ploughshares report highlights:

“According to publicly available US Department of Defense (DOD) procurement records, in September 2024 a Canadian Crown corporation signed a contract to provide the US DOD with artillery propellants that will be supplied to Israel.

The September 2024 contract concerns the supply of M31A2 Triple Base propellant, a type of explosive fuel used to launch artillery shells. M31A2 propellant is specifically required in the 155mm M232A1 propelling charge, which is one of two charges used in the Modular Artillery Charge System (MACS).

Throughout Operation Swords of Iron, Israel has relied heavily on 155mm shells, most supplied by the US government. In the operation’s first 1.5 months, Israeli artillery brigades reportedly fired approximately 10,000 of these shells into Gaza.“

Quakers note Israel’s use of 155mm shells

The American Friends Service Committee (Quakers) has also posted about “companies profiting from the Gaza genocide” and the use of these 155mm shells.

General Dynamics and the Canadian Commercial Corporation at CANSEC

Last year, General Dynamics posted: “Three business units of General Dynamics will be among the exhibitors at CANSEC 2024” including General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems-Canada, highlighting “Artillery Propellant”, “the sole source provider for the US Army’s 155mm MACS High Zone propellant.

X image: GD at CANSEC.

X image: The Canadian Commercial Corporation is a regular exhibitor at CANSEC. Their website notes: “As a Government of Canada agency, CCC is here to support foreign governments in their mandate to successfully deliver projects to their citizens.”

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.”

Human rights defenders targeted

Dublin-based Front Line Defenders has stated: “Those defending the right to health and the right to life as doctors, nurses, or ambulance workers, those exposing and documenting war crimes as journalists, and those providing humanitarian support as volunteers or employees of aid agencies were all specifically targeted by Israeli bombs or guns.”

To date, as many as 1,586 human rights defenders have been killed in Gaza, including 175 journalists, 408 aid workers, more than 1,000 medical staff, 2 lawyers, and 1 International Solidarity Movement volunteer (in the West Bank).

Peace Brigades International has called on the international community to suspend the supply of arms to Israel.

Photo: Amnesty International photo that includes 155mm shells, including some “labelled D528, the US Department of Defense Identification Code (DODIC) for white phosphorus-based rounds.”

CANSEC 2025

For updates on CANSEC 2025, see @shut.down.cansec on Instagram.

The Guardian reports on the killing of environmental defender Juan Bautista Silva and his son Juan Antonio Hernández

By
Brent Patterson
-

Photo: Environmental defender Juan Bautista Silva Ventura and his son Juan Antonio.

On February 28, COPINH posted:

“ALERT

Environmentalist Juan Bautista Silva Ventura and his son Juan Antonio were murdered in the community of Las Botijas, Comayagua. They disappeared after documenting illegal logging in the area and were found dead on February 27.

This crime is not an isolated incident. It adds to the systematic violence against those who defend the land and the environment in Honduras.

We demand that the Honduran Public Ministry carry out an immediate, transparent investigation and punish those responsible.

No more impunity! Defending life cannot cost us our lives.”

Now, The Guardian reports:

“At about 6pm on Wednesday 26 February, Ana Luiza Hernández Raudelez saw her partner, Juan Bautista Silva, 70, receive a phone call.

A land defender who had spent more than 20 years working for the local environment, Silva was preparing to leave on a motorcycle trip to photograph illegal logging near Las Botijas, in Comayagua, central Honduras, to support a complaint to the prosecutor’s office.

As he was about to set off, Ana suggested he take their son, Juan Antonio Hernández, 20, with him, as his new mobile phone took better photos.

The next day, father and son were found dead and dismembered below a cliff close to Las Botijas.

Honduras the most dangerous country per capita for defenders

The murders are a fresh reminder of the severe violence faced by nature defenders in Honduras, which in 2023 became the country with the highest number of defenders killed per capita in the world.

Laura Furones, a senior adviser at Global Witness, says Honduras emerges “pretty regularly” as a “worrying country” for land defenders’ rights. Among the factors behind the high rate of violence against land defenders, she explains, is the presence of natural resources, which may be exploited for agricultural purposes or corporate interests.

Activists who are perceived to “get in the way of these interests” may risk being attacked as well, she says.

Frank Cruz, Conadeh’s coordinator of the Office of the Ombudsman for Indigenous and Afro-Honduran people, says cases like the death of Silvas and his son will further dissuade land defenders from reporting environmental crimes. “The message sent is: ‘do not report, because if you report, you will be killed.’”

Deterrence needed

“If the aggressors or perpetrators of these crimes, deaths and acts of violence knew they would face investigation, charges, and prosecution at the hands of state organs, they would not commit these crimes,” Cruz says, adding that the government needs to implement medium- and long-term measures to “regain the confidence” of such communities. “The less impunity there is, the less normalisation. The more prosecution there is, the more awareness.”

Blanca Jeannette Kawas Fernández

The country has previously faced condemnation for its handling of environmentalists’ murders. In April 2009, Honduras was sentenced by the Inter-American court for the death of Blanca Jeannette Kawas Fernández, an environmental activist who was shot and killed in February 1995.

Kawas had publicly opposed illegal logging and economic projects to be implemented on the Punta Sal Peninsula on the northern coast. At least one agent of the state was found by the court to have been involved in her death.

Berta Cáceres

In March 2016, environmental activist Berta Cáceres was shot dead, sparking violent clashes. Prior to her death, Cáceres had been involved in efforts to prevent the construction of a hydroelectric dam on the Gualcarque River, considered sacred by the Lenca Indigenous community.

Cáceres, the winner of the 2015 Goldman Environmental prize, had long faced threats and was found to have been killed by hitmen.

Juan López

The murder of Juan López – an anti-mining activist, water defender, and local religious leader – in September 2024 sparked international condemnation, including from the Biden administration and the pope.

López was driving home from church when a group of men shot him. Since 2018, López had been advocating against a mining project in the Carlos Escaleras national park, named in memory of another Honduran environmentalist, who was murdered in October 1997.

Update on investigation

Over a month has passed since Silvas’ and Antonio’s deaths. No suspects have been arrested. There have been no updates since 19 March, when police commissioner Miguel Martínez said that the case was “now in the hands of the public prosecutor’s office”, adding that “everything is moving forwards”.”

The full article can be read at Killed, dismembered and scattered: the Honduran father and son who made a stand against illegal logging (The Guardian, April 14, 2025).

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