InterReligious Task Force on Central America

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has now ruled in favor of four communities harmed by the government of Honduras and outside investors.

The ancestral homelands of the Garífuna people are the coastal lands of northern Honduras and islands just off  the coast. In 2003 they began filing legal complaints with the the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (based in Washington, DC for their government’s violation of its cultural and territorial rights.  Now more than a decade since the first court ruling in their favor, the government of Honduras has failed to implement the court orders. A big stumbling block is that the communities that won their cases in the Inter-American Court (2015: Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra; 2023: San Juan) are fighting private corporations and foreign investors who have a lot at stake. Some have already illegally usurped lands and built tourist resorts, so it’s tricky to figure out how to return ancestral lands to the Garífuna people and compensate the companies and investors for their losses.

As Garífuna leaders have become more vocal after the 2015 ruling, the persecution against them has increased—surveillance, intimidation, violence, criminalization. Repression is expected to increase following the fourth favorable ruling by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. On March 4, 2026, the international body “declared the State of Honduras responsible for the violation of the rights to collective property, participation, access to information, cultural identity, food and personal integrity of the Garífuna Community of Cayos Cochinos and its members.”

 Cayos Cochinos or Cochinos Cays consist of two small islands and 13 smaller coral cays situated 19 miles northeast of La Ceiba on the Atlantic coast of Honduras. The archipelago of cays is an ancestral home for the Garífuna people, whose subsistence, cultural identity and spiritual relationship are closely linked to the sea and artisanal fishing. Once the state declared the cays a protected environmental area, it authorized tourism and reality TV filming but restricted the Garífuna’s fishing rights. All of this done, of course, without prior, free and informed consultation of the community—in violation of international law.

For more than four decades, IRTF has welcomed dozens of interns who have helped carry forward our mission of promoting peace, human rights and systemic transformation across the Americas. Each year, our interns enter the living legacy of IRTF: never-ending advocacy, organizing, and accompaniment. Their experiences, like those of Lucia and Maddie, remind us of the importance of this work and of forming the next generation of justice seekers.

Maddie: As a small organization and a tight-knit community, IRTF’s support is direct. This summer, we accompanied migrants to their immigration hearings, speaking with them in a mix of broken English and Spanish, learning their stories and offering them support and companionship. We connected with other community groups to learn how we could best inform local migrant and refugee families through Know Your Rights training. We challenged our own comfort and security by attempting to take on the fear and uncertainty faced by the migrant community.

Lucia: IRTF has been an indispensable part of discerning the world I want to live in, the role I will have in that, and the way I hope to go about it. This haven of social justice, activism, and human-centered civic engagement has become the foundation on which I hope to build a lifetime of advocacy and purposeful action.

Please read more from the reflections of student interns Maddie and Lucia.

This article prents a report by a group of international jurists, reviewing Bukeles governmnet and contradictions between domestic popularity in El Salvador and how international organizations judgement of the government. 

another notable article about El Salvador mass arrests: click

The history of bananas makes many people uncomfortable.

The industry is rooted in power imbalance. Whether it was tax-free land in Costa Rica (for United Fruit/Chiquita in 1884), forced labor by financing paramilitaries (2024 verdict for Colombian victims1), or chemicals like DBCP sold for use abroad even after having its production shut down in the U.S. for causing sterility2 (e.g. to Standard Fruit/Dole in Nicaragua3), there’s no shortage of examples of abuse of power and control. 

This article by Equal Exchange gives insight into what is possible when farmers are granted land and form co-ops unraveling power dynamics .

This nacla article sheds light on the Ch'orti' people's legal struggle against mining operations that contaminate their water and thus endanger their health and agricultural possibilities. 

The killing of Indigenous environmental defender Berta Cáceres on March 2, 2016 was not unique.  More than 1,000 people were killed for political reasons during the 12 years of the narco-dictatorship. The people of Honduras know that when communities organize in defense of their territories, they too often face militarization, repression, criminalization, and violence. But Berta’s assassination does remain as one of the most visible symbols of the risks borne by land and environmental defenders.  The behind-the-scenes plotting of her brutal assassination is slightly complicated but the  reasons very straight forward.  The narco-dictatorship that “opened up Honduras for business” tried to kill the organized resistance to their mega-projects (like the privatization of the Gualcarque River for foreign investors' hydro-electric project) that illegally dispossess Indigenous and campesino communities of land, water, and self-determination. 

How can we honor Berta?

For one, we can affirm the demand of the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organization of Honduras (COPINH) that the intellectual authors of the assassination be brought to justice. Moreover, we can do what Berta would do. Live, organize, educate, work and struggle together. Reach out and support the too many victims of this violent, unjust and unequal global human order. Name, denounce and hold accountable the responsible actors—countries,  companies, wealthy elites, banks, investors and more. Organize, educate, work and struggle against all injustice, inequality and discrimination. Live with the knowledge that another world is indeed necessary and act as though we believe it is indeed possible.

To support IRTF’s accompaniment work with human rights and environmental defenders in Honduras, click here.

The Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns provides a coherent overview of the U.S. Foreign Aid Budget for Latin America.  Congress maintained rigorous “conditions” on aid, meaning governments must meet specific benchmarks to receive full funding. In Central America, 50% of select funds for El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras are withheld until the State Department certifies these nations are combating corruption and protecting journalists and activists. For Colombia, 25% of counter-narcotics funding and 20% of military financing are tied to progress in reducing coca cultivation and prosecuting human rights violations.Notably, for Mexico, human rights conditions are absent. Current restrictions focus almost exclusively on water delivery to the U.S. and the dismantling of fentanyl-trafficking cartels.

This article published in The Guaradian talks about the excruciating reality of criminalization faced by Salvadoran women who face obstetric emergencies.  

In March 2022, President Nayib Bukele – a populist who described himself as the “world’s coolest dictator” – assumed emergency powers and suspended civil rights in a move known as the “state of exception”. Framed as a temporary response to combat rampant gang violence, the crackdown has had far-reaching consequences for human rights and the justice system. Due process has been suspended, and about one in 50 adults imprisoned.

Advocates say those emergency powers have quietly expanded into hospitals, ensnaring women who suffer miscarriages, stillbirths and other obstetric emergencies. There is a new spiral of criminalization against women.