On this day, 18 March 2019, Bribrí Indigenous leader, Sergio Rojas, was assassinated in Costa Rica. Rojas, who was co-coordinator of the National Front of Indigenous People (FRENAPI), had been campaigning since 2010 for the return of Indigenous land.
By law, 11,700 hectares of land is legally owned by Bribrí and Teribe people. However, thousands of non-Indigenous settlers occupy at least 60% of it, and consider the Indigenous people to be “invaders.”
Violent attacks by settlers on Indigenous people campaigning to reclaim their land are frequent in the region, and while the courts have ordered the Costa Rican government to take action to protect Bribrí people, they have failed to do so and typically attacks are not even investigated, let alone prosecuted.
Rojas himself had reported threats made against him to prosecutors, and was living separately from his wife and children in order to protect them at the time he was killed in his home. https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1377812722403874/?type=3