(Senate - November
09, 2017)
(en ESPAÑOL)
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I want to speak about a subject that many Senators are aware of and should be deeply concerned about.
As we remember, in the early morning hours of
March 3, 2016, Honduras lost one of
its most courageous and charismatic indigenous leaders,
Berta Caceres.
Ms. Caceres was the general coordinator of the
National Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras, COPINH.
National Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras, COPINH.
She was gunned down
by assassins in her home in the village of La Esperanza,
Intibuca.
Berta Caceres spent her life defending
indigenous rights, particularly to
land and natural resources. In 2015, she won the prestigious Goldman
Environmental Prize for her outstanding activism and
leadership. She and COPINH had been supporting land struggles
throughout western Honduras, and because of that--because she was exercising
rights guaranteed by Honduran law and international
law--she and the communities that she and COPINH supported were the
frequent targets of death threats.
