UN envoy warns of environmental activist murder ‘epidemic’
UN envoy warns of environmental activist murder ‘epidemic’
Expert on indigenous rights demands consumers boycott ‘blood-tainted’ products from land grabs amid weak state response, Climate Home reports
Alex Pashley for Climate Home, part of the Guardian Environment Network
Friday 18 March 2016 12.08 EDT
The killings of indigenous activists in Honduras signal a growing “epidemic” around the world, a UN envoy has declared.
Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, urged governments to give protection to forest defenders in an interview.
Prize-winning campaigner Berta Caceres was slain by gunmen earlier this month weeks after opposing a hydroelectric dam in the dangerous central American state.
This week a member of her organisation, Nelson Garcia, was killed by security forces during an eviction of an indigenous community.
“The pattern of killings in many countries is becoming an epidemic definitely,” Tauli-Corpuz told Climate Home by phone from Brazil where she is investigating violence faced by Amazonian tribes.
At least 116 environmental defenders were killed in 2014, according to NGO Global Witness, with 40% of whom were indigenous.
More:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/18/un-envoy-warns-of-environmental-activist-epidemic
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