IRTF News

Abortion was banned completely in Colombia until 2006, when an initial constitutional court ruling—prompted by several of today’s Causa Justa activists—decriminalized terminations on three grounds: if the life or health of the woman was at risk; in cases of severe fetal abnormality; and if the pregnancy was the result of rape. Colombia is now “at the forefront of the region and the world,” according to doctor and feminist activist Ana Cristina González, a spokesperson for Causa Justa. In February, Colombia’s constitutional court removed abortion (up to 24 weeks) from the criminal code in response to a court case brought by Causa Justa—the spearhead of a wide-ranging social and legal campaign of more than 120 groups and thousands of activists....Latin America continues to push the limits of what is possible. Barely a month after the Colombian ruling, Chile’s constitutional convention—which is drafting a new constitution for the country—passed (by a large majority) an article enshrining sexual and reproductive rights as fundamental and guaranteed by the state. 

For many years, the jungle region known as La Mosquitia in northeast Honduras has been an ideal corridor for international drug trafficking. However, another criminal economy has emerged at the same time: illegal cattle ranching. As a result, the region has been plunged into a state of terror, where criminals threaten the land and the Indigenous communities that inhabit it. The Rio Plátano Biosphere Reserve is the largest protected reserve in Honduras. It’s located in a region known as La Mosquitia, covering the departments of Gracias a Dios, Colón and Olancho in the far northeast reaches of the country along the border with Nicaragua. The majority of this area is covered by jungle and ancestral territory for a number of Indigenous communities. According to the reserve's Indigenous communities, settlers come to La Mosquitia to find land to raise bovine cattle, which are primarily used for their meat. The settlers ride around openly through the jungle in jeeps, cutting down trees with chainsaws, setting fire to the land and planting pastures to feed thousands of cattle, despite this being a protected area. These individuals also come heavily armed, and have other reasons for cattle ranching: facilitating cocaine trafficking and laundering the illicit proceeds it generates.

The US has barred Guatemala's Attorney General Consuelo Porras from entering the country, accusing her of being involved in corruption. The US state department said Ms Porras had "repeatedly obstructed and undermined anti-corruption investigations in Guatemala". Ms Porras has denied any wrongdoing and said that fighting corruption has been her priority. On Monday, she was sworn in for a second four-year term in office.

More than 30,000 people have been arrested under a “state of exception” in El Salvador, police said, as President Nayib Bukele’s crackdown on armed gangs continues. El Salvador’s Congress approved a “state of exception” in late March after a weekend of gang-related violence left more than 80 people dead, spurring widespread fears among residents in the Central American nation. The order, under which the authorities have been able to suspend certain civil liberties, was renewed for another 30 days in late April. Salvadoran police said on Twitter on Monday that 30,506 arrests had been carried out “since the start of the war against the gangs”, including “536 terrorists” who were arrested on Sunday alone.

The Associated Press reports: “A plan to create special self-governing zones for foreign investors in Honduras has been thrown into limbo with the new government’s repeal of a law many criticized as surrendering sovereignty. [The zones for employment and economic development known as ZEDEs are] free from import and export taxes, but could set up their own internal forms of government, as well as courts, security forces, schools and even social security systems." The article refers to the zones already being developed, including Prospera (a 58-acre development on the island of Roatan) and Orquidea (an agro-industrial park near the city of Choluteca that produces peppers and tomatoes for export).

The Biden Administration expelled 450 people to Haiti, including 44 children, 20 of whom were infants, on three flights this week. These flights bring the total to 235 expulsion flights to Haiti since Biden took office, more than 23,000 people in total, and 21,000 in the eight months since the debacle in Del Rio last September. Another 8,000 people were summarily expelled into Mexico during the Del Rio crisis. Over the last few months, the number of people attempting to flee Haiti by boat has also increased dramatically, as measured by those captured and returned to Haiti by the Coast Guard. Within Haiti there is political stagnation and spiraling violence. At last 39 people have been killed in gang violence in the Port au Prince metro area since the end of April, and 10,000 people have been forced from their homes. This humanitarian disaster is what Biden is expelling people into; hundreds of people every week are caught in a relentless campaign of mass expulsions. 

A Guatemala judge who last week ordered nine former police and military officers to stand trial for alleged crimes during that country’s civil war, said Wednesday that death threats against him had increased since announcing his decision. “They send me messages, they call me on the phone, there’s vehicles following; all of that is happening,” Magistrate Miguel Ángel Gálvez said. Gálvez is no stranger to high-profile cases. He once ordered former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt to be tried. “Before they had threatened me, but now they even come to hearings to photograph me,” he said. Meanwhile, Gálvez fears the government is trying to build a case against him, as has been the case with other judges and prosecutors who have worked on sensitive corruption cases, which are also sometimes part of his docket.

“This marks a sad anniversary. The injuries suffered by the victims and their families are compounded by an utter lack of accountability and total absence of any effort to make the victims whole. There is no viable route to justice open to them,” said Annie Bird, a human rights advocate and coauthor, with CEPR international policy director Alex Main, of the 2012 report “Collateral Damage of a Drug War: The May 11 Killings in Ahuas and the Impact of the US War on Drugs on La Moskitia, Honduras.” Ten years after a notorious DEA-led operation resulted in the deaths of four villagers from the Indigenous Miskitu community of Ahuas in northeastern Honduras, and the shooting of several others, survivors and family members are still awaiting recompense. And while five years ago this month the Offices of the Inspectors General (OIG) of the US Department of Justice and of the US Department State issued a report concluding the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA’s) responsibility for leading the operation, none of the individuals responsible have been held accountable.

"Ten years ago today a joint counter-narcotics team of Honduran security agents and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officers opened fire on a water taxi as it approached Ahuas, a small town located in the remote Mosquitia region of northeastern Honduras. While the Honduran police announced that a “successful” drug interdiction mission had taken place, journalists and human rights advocates reported the victims were unarmed and had no known links to drug trafficking.  Instead of taking responsibility, assessing their mistakes, and examining their methods and partnerships with Honduran security forces, DEA and State Department officials obstructed U.S. and Honduran investigations of the incident and falsely reported to Members of Congress, including my staff, that the boat’s passengers had fired on security forces." -- Read Senator Leahy's statement on the ten-year anniversary of the massacre of Ahuas, Honduras.

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) will begin a two-day hearing Thursday on a lawsuit against Colombia for alleged persecution, harassment and espionage against the José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers' Collective, a human rights organization. This will be the first time that a human rights organization will come to this instance as a victim, informed the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), which is representing the victims in this case. CEJIL and CAJAR expressed in a statement that this litigation "represents an opportunity to help transform the current scenario of serious violations against human rights defenders throughout the continent, a situation that reduces the capacity to defend rights and limits justice and democracy".