Environmental Activist Killed In Honduras

[ad_1]

Text size

An environmental activist working to oppose mining in Honduras was shot and killed, President Xiomara Castro said.

Juan Lopez was killed as he left church Saturday in the northeastern town of Tocoa, his widow Thelma Pena told AFP.

Castro condemned the killing in a post on the social media platform X late Saturday and said she had ordered an investigation into it.

"Justice for Juan Lopez," Castro wrote.

Lopez, who belonged to the ruling Libre party, worked to oppose open-pit iron ore mining in Tocoa, where he worked in the town hall.

At a recent news conference he called for the resignation of Libre officials caught on a video negotiating bribes with drug traffickers in 2013.

That video ensnared Carlos Zelaya, a brother-in-law of the president. He resigned his seat in congress after admitting he took part in that meeting with drug gangsters.

In an interview with AFP in 2021, Lopez discussed the risks that he said environmental activists face in this poor and violent Central American country.

"If you start defending common interests in this country," he said, "you clash with major interests."

"If you leave home, you always have in mind that you do not know what might happen, if you are going to return," said Lopez.

The NGO Global Witness says Honduras is one of the world's most dangerous countries for environmental activists.

In 2023 it was ranked third in the world for the number of killings of such activists at 18, tied with Mexico. The top two were Colombia and Brazil.

The organization said that from 2012 to 2023, 148 environmental campaigners were killed in Honduras.

nl-hma/val/dw/bbk

[ad_1]

Source link : http://www.bing.com/news/apiclick.aspx?ref=FexRss&aid=&tid=66e6f5f3776c4b9fa3457e92c916b1fe&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.barrons.com%2Fnews%2Fenvironmental-activist-killed-in-honduras-e8abd38d&c=10354880555060301610&mkt=en-us Author : Publish date : 2024-09-15 02:42:00 Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source .