Latin America’s land ‘defenders’ attacked most, rights group says

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According to Global Witness, a human rights nonprofit, an individual will be killed every two days in 2022 while trying to protect land or the environment, with Latin America recording the highest number of deaths.

The group said at least 177 people known as “champions,” those who seek to prevent their land or homes from environmental degradation, were victims of targeted violence last year.

In total, the movement has documented nearly 2,000 killings in the decade since it began documenting deaths.

Although it is often difficult to determine the exact circumstances behind an attack, about 10 percent of attacks are linked to agriculture, mining and logging.

Demand for minerals for renewable energy technologies means parts of Southeast Asia, such as northern Myanmar and neighboring China, are now sites of illegal mining, fueling the violence, Global Witness said.

“With demand outstripping supply, governments and companies are beginning to capitalize on ‘new frontier’ opportunities in the mining industry across the region, often without addressing the root causes of the supply chain,” the group said.

In 2022, more than one-third of victims will be indigenous, and around one-fifth will be small farmers. However, lawyers and journalists have also been targeted: Guardian writer Dom Phillips and Brazilian native Bruno Pereira were found shot while reporting on environmental vandalism in Brazil.

Latin America accounted for 88 percent of recorded killings. Colombia saw the highest number of deaths, with 60 deaths, double the number of last year. Brazil and Mexico followed with 34 and 31 deaths respectively. In Asia, the Philippines accounted for the majority of the 16 deaths.

Activists say political instability in parts of Latin America and Africa is the backdrop for the deaths.

In Colombia, delays in the implementation of the peace agreement between the government and the National Liberation Army have created a power vacuum and new armed groups have started preying on land defenders, said Ana Maria Rodriguez, director of the Colombian Council of Jurists.

“The dynamics of the conflict have changed,” she said. “In the battle, some communities are left alone.”

Peter Quaqua of Liberian environmental and human rights group Green Advocates International said documenting activists’ welfare in West Africa was “serious and challenging” because a recent “surge in military takeovers has blown the civic space”.

Global Witness also noted that non-lethal attacks on activists are on the rise, using intimidation and imprisonment to suppress their efforts.

Chad Booc, a 27-year-old Filipino computer science graduate and advocate for the Lumad indigenous people, was charged with abducting and radicalizing children in 2021 and served three years in prison. months before the charges against him were eventually dropped. A year later, he was found dead.