On this day, 2 March 2016, Honduran Indigenous environmental activist Berta Cáceres was assassinated in her home. Of Lenca descent, she co-founded the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), and was a leading participant in defending Lenca land from illegal logging and US military bases. She was also an advocate for LGBT+ and women’s rights, and believed that: “Mother Earth – militarized, fenced-in, poisoned, a place where basic rights are systematically violated – demands that we take action.”
At the time of her murder, Cáceres was heavily in Indigenous protests against hydroelectric dams being constructed by energy company DESA alongside Chinese firm Sinohydro and the World Bank. Several members of COPINH were killed by the Honduran military and company security during protests, which eventually forced Sinohydro and the World Bank to withdraw from the project. Cáceres was eventually shot dead in her home. A Mexican environmentalist, Gustavo Castro Soto, was also shot twice but survived.
Nine men were later arrested and charged for the murder. They included the executive president of DESA, who was also a former military intelligence officer, as well as three other current or retired military officers, two of whom had been trained by the US military at the notorious School of the Americas. Seven low ranking conspirators were subsequently convicted and jailed. The DESA president is due to go on trial next month.
Learn more about her life and murder in this book: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/who-killed-berta-caceres-nina-lakhani https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1663515243833619/?type=3