The Gualcarque Fraud trial begins in violation of the rights of the victims.
Before the beginning of the oral and public trial of the case called “Fraude Sobre el Gualcarque” COPINH (Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras) shares the following:
- The indigenous community of Rio Blanco, organized in COPINH, once again sees its rights violated. Now the State of Honduras denies the status of victim to those who have suffered from the violence and death of the Agua Zarca hydroelectric project.
- Article 17 of the criminal procedural code gives us the right to participate as victims in this process, being the community and organization directly affected by the corruption of the project.
- International conventions and standards recognize the victims of corruption cases, the Honduran justice system has once again failed the indigenous communities.
- The fraudulent permits and licenses that allowed the operation of the illegal Agua Zarca project are the origin of the murder of Berta Cáceres, the public officials responsible must be condemned for these crimes.
- COPINH demands that the main beneficiaries of the fraud of the Agua Zarca project, the Atala Zablah family, be prosecuted and convicted.
- The Lenca communities demand that the sacred Gualcarque River be freed, and that the illegal concession that has oppressed it for more than a decade be cancelled immediately and definitively.
“With the ancestral strength of Berta, Lempira, Mota, Iselaca and Etempica, our voices are raised full of life, justice, freedom, dignity and peace”
Given in the city of Tegucigalpa on August 23, 2021.