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Migrant Justice: ICE announces it's cutting the Bristol County Detention Center's contract -- a huge win for the immigrant rights community
May 20, 2021

The FANG Collective and Detention Watch Network are celebrating the news that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will cut the contract at the Bristol County Detention Center in Massachusetts. Along with the end of the Irwin Detention Center contract in Georgia, also announced today, this is the first time ICE has cut a contract for a detention center in recent years. The announcement signals a major win for people who’ve been detained at the facility and bravely spoken out against its abuses and for local organizations who have long fought to shut it down. The announcement comes five months after the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office found that the Bristol County Sheriff’s Office violated the civil rights of currently detained people in ICE custody

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News Article
Colombia: We condemn sexual violence committed by police
May 16, 2021

Together with the movement against militarism in Colombia, we denounce the sexual violence committed by members of the ESMAD anti-riot police that also caused a young woman to commit suicide. We raise our voices in outrage at the systematic sexual and gender violence carried out by the Army and the Public Force members. These violations are a serious expression of patriarchal violence exercised under the power of an institutional armed actor, which legalizes and legitimizes the idea that power is exercised over the bodies of women, teenagers, and girls. We join with civil society organizations across Colombia who are organizing resistance to war and speaking out against all forms of violence.

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RRN Letter
Honduras, 05/16/2021
May 16, 2021
Five thousand members of the Indigenous Tolupán community of Agalteca in Yoro Department are being threatened with eviction. Tolupán lands contain precious resources, such as mahogany forests, silver, and iron oxide. To seize those resources, those with economic interests carry out attempts at forcible evictions (some successful). As a consequence of government concessions to mining companies over the past eight years, Tolupán communities have experienced an increase in evictions, as well as destruction of their land and waterways. Those who resist outside encroachment on their ancestral territories suffer attacks, murders, and judicial harassment. Over the past twenty years, forty Tolupán community members have been murdered.
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RRN Letter
El Salvador, 05/15/2021
May 15, 2021
Many sacrifices have been made by the people of El Salvador to build a democratic system of government. Tens of thousands fought and died for a democratic El Salvador during the civil war; one million people had to flee as refugees to escape the massacres and other armed violence. Now the president and members of the Legislative Assembly are actively weakening democracy. On May 1, a coalition of four political parties (led by the majority New Ideas party) wiped out the judiciary when it fired all five magistrates of the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court without adhering to constitutionally-established justifications for doing so. Attorney General Raul Melara was also dismissed. We are calling on President Bukele and the Legislative Assembly to reverse the firing of the Supreme Court magistrates and grant them a defense hearing, as is their right under the law. Maintaining an independent judiciary is crucial to strengthening democracy in El Salvador.
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RRN Letter
Honduras, 05/14/2021
May 14, 2021
The National Electric Power Company (ENEE) has been granting licenses to private companies to construct thermoelectric generation plants without the prior consultation and consent of impacted populations. In Baracoa, the National Police broke up a demonstration of residents along highway CA-13 by firing tear gas canisters at the residents. Residents are also concerned that they will not be given the opportunity to attend town meetings at which final approval for the electric generation plant will be given. Residents near other thermoelectric plants in Honduras face health risks from being exposed to constant emissions from turbines, including emissions from fuels so toxic that they are banned in other countries.
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RRN Letter
Colombia, 05/13/21
May 13, 2021
State-sponsored violence against popular demonstrations across Colombia has left upwards of 40 people dead. We are calling on the government to: (1) withdraw all military personnel from the streets because soldiers are trained for armed conflict, not for public safety; (2) investigate all reports of violence against demonstrators by security personnel and address any violations of human rights; (3) continue official talks with the National Strike Committee, which represents various groups including indigenous people, unions, environmentalists and students, to discuss key demands; (4) stop stigmatizing protesters and suggesting that they are linked to armed rebel groups; (5) guarantee the rights of peaceful assembly and to protest
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RRN Letter
Honduras, 05/12/2021
May 12, 2021
National Police (and suspected military personnel as well) are waging armed violence against members of the Tolupán indigenous community of San Francisco de Locomapa in Yoro Department. On May 5, National Police fired on their encampment (Campamento Digno por la Defensa del Bosque y el Territorio Tolupán) that was set up to protect a pine forest against illegal logging. Norma Yackelin Ávila suffered a gunshot. We are unsure how many others might have been wounded.
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News Article
Legacy Circle: Extend your commitment to human rights by making a planned gift to IRTF
May 11, 2021
Start your legacy for a better world with IRTF. Consider designating a planned gift to IRTF as part of your financial and estate planning.
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RRN Letter
Honduras, 05/11/2021
May 11, 2021
A man was approached by unknown persons on the streets of the Garífuna community Nueva Armenia and threatened: “if you do not want to die, stop hanging around Mabel Robledo, because we have already been authorized them to kill her." A half-hour earlier, an unknown individual entered Mabel Robledo's place of business and threatened: “…we are going to kill you.” This occurred after Mabel Robledo denounced before local and national officials the appropriation of ancestral Garífuna territories by palm growers and the extraction of sand from the Papaloteca River by drug traffickers.
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Content Page
Please take Urgent Actions to Stop New Illegal Coercive Measures against Nicaragua!
May 10, 2021

Dear Friends,

We’re contacting you again to ask urgently for your help to stop new sanctions on Nicaragua. There is currently a bi-partisan bill in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee called the RENACER Act that will impose a new set of sanctions on Nicaragua (Illegal coercive measures). Please see talking points below for background information on the RENACER Act. 

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