Garifuna land defenders vs. Survivor (as in the TV show) | The Spill

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Amy Westervelt: Hello, and welcome back to The Spill. It’s the three of us here again together. Hooray.

Alleen Brown: Hooray.

Amy Westervelt: I’m Amy Westervelt. I’m joined by Alleen Brown and Nina Lakhani, and today we’re gonna talk about increasing criminalization of environmental protestors across the board, but especially what’s happening in Honduras with the Garifuna which is a community that Nina’s reported on for a long time.

Before that, let’s talk a little bit about how this is playing out kind of in general and [00:04:00] has played out in, in some of our reporting recently, too. Alleen, you were just in, North Dakota for the Standing Rock anniversary, right?

Alleen Brown: Yeah, I was. So I went out to Standing Rock Reservation and attended a couple different anniversary events. There was this, sort of this grassroots gathering on the land of, this woman who was really involved in the No DAPL movement, the movement to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline, um, which for those who don’t remember, happened in 2016 and 2017.

Huge thousands of people kind of occupied the prairie, trying to stop this oil pipeline. So, you know, people were getting together and really reflecting on the past 10 years and, and just reconnecting with, with each other. There was also a separate event at, um, the tribe’s casino, uh, which was a conference on renewable energy, really centered around indigenous groups doing renewable energy projects.

And so, you know, it was really [00:05:00] interesting. I also was chatting with people around Bismarck and Mandan, which are these, uh, cities that are close by. They’re effectively border communities, because people from the Standing Rock Reservation go there to buy, buy groceries, go to Walmart, um, you know, do things like that, and there’s, there’s this long history of racism there.

So that community was a target of anti-protest propaganda, um, during that uprising, something that we covered in our recent series, The Propagandist. But so I was kind of talking to people at all these events and, and learning about how, you know, what the, what the past 10 years has brought. I think one of my biggest takeaways is, you know, I think we’re gonna talk about Global Witness’s annual report on killings of land defenders internationally.

A lot of people at this gathering were talking about the mental health impacts of being criminalized.

Amy Westervelt: Mm.

Alleen Brown: They talked about one woman who was bitten by this private security dog, um, at the [00:06:00] beginning, in this infamous in- incident that happened at the beginning of, um, that movement. You know, she talked about sort of struggling with addiction and mental health issues for years.

You know, only pretty recently kind of got back on her feet. Another guy who faced federal charges, you know, said that those years when he was dealing with that, with that really, like, pushed him to the brink. Um, you know, these are Indigenous land defenders, and I think that’s an aspect of criminalization that we don’t talk about a lot and that doesn’t often get tracked in these reports.

You know, Standing Rock happened at the beginning of, or the No DAPL movement happened at the beginning of Trump’s first term. And I think that’s really kind of the beginning of this period of increasing, or a beginning of this period of increasing criminalization of land and environmental defenders, um, across the US and even internationally.

And, you know, that’s now 10 years ago, so it kind of [00:07:00] provides ag- a preview into the kind of — an aspect of this growing, um, authoritarianism and criminalization, again, that we don’t talk about often. So what, what does it mean if police violence causes serious mental health harms? How do you account for that?

So that’s one thing I was thinking about. It was also just really interesting because the people in, Mandan, North Dakota, which, who again were targeted by this anti-protest propaganda, people have really strong sentiments against the water protector movement, the No DAPL movement. They were, really felt like their lives were disrupted, and again, that was fueled by Facebook content that was created by the pipeline company and, um, their private security firm.

So now they are facing a data center that is being built in the middle of their town. Like, it’s really, like, sort of almost across the street from their high school or j- or very close to their brand-new high school. And [00:08:00] they are, like, organizing petitions. They’re doing all this, um, this organizing to stop it.

I was sort of curious. I was like, “Oh, maybe this, like, changed the way that they’re thinking about these protests that happened here years ago.” My quick, um, survey and interviews with folks that were signing these petitions indicated that it has not changed hearts and minds. But, um, but it’s just, uh, sort of fascinating to see, um, that the fight for, um, protecting land and water ultimately touches us all.

And, you know, I wonder if there are opportunities for, for solidarity in that. I guess we’ll see.

Amy Westervelt: Interesting. You mentioned the Global Witness report, and it just came out, right? What does this report say?

Nina Lakhani: I mean, it says that as every year, um, the vast majority of documented assassinations of land and environmental defenders is in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Amy Westervelt: Mhm.

Nina Lakhani: And I think Latin America [00:09:00] continues to appear as the, you know, the most dangerous region in the world to defend land and environment in partly because communities are so

organized

Alleen Brown: Right

Nina Lakhani: so there is resi- there are resistance movements

Amy Westervelt: Ja

Nina Lakhani: um, that date back centuries, right? And, and certainly were, like, cemented and sort of, um, deepened during the Cold War period, during all the dirty wars

that happened. So I think that’s part of it. Also, this is a very, um, resource-rich, um, continent, you know.

And so, it’s sort of land disputes over mining, over coastal areas, um, deforestation, fossil

fuel

projects

Amy Westervelt: Mhm.

Nina Lakhani: you know, historically. But I think what we’re increasingly starting to see, and isn’t quite coming through yet in, like, the hard data are the sort of, is, is the repression and violence against communities who are, um, who are struggling and resisting, um,

renewable energy projects and data centers.

Alleen Brown: Yeah

Nina Lakhani: That’s what’s coming

next, you know? Um, I think three-quarters of their documented murders were [00:10:00] of

Amy Westervelt: Wow

Nina Lakhani: Indigenous people, campesinos, peasant farmers, and Afro-descendant community leaders, right?

So that’s, like, stark, you know, really stark. Um, but you know, I do think we should just point out that — this is, you know, there’s, there’s a real dearth of data across many regions in the

world

Amy Westervelt: Ja

Nina Lakhani: you know, and I think, you know, Global Witness would be the first to say that, that assassinations are sort of like the very tip of the iceberg.

Below that, you have, you

know criminalization across

Latin America.

Thousands of people who are in

prison

or have been arrested and charged with usurpación, which, you know, basically means aggravated

trespass. So people who are being convicted criminally, um, for b- being on their own land, right?

But also a whole array of charges, terrorism, other national security stuff, you know. And then below that, you’ve got, like you’re saying, the huge mental health impacts.

So, so we really count on sort of these [00:11:00] hard numbers, which again are not f- you know, are, are, are an underestimate themselves, but that’s the sort of, you know, unfortunately, you

Alleen Brown: Yeah.

Nina Lakhani: assassinations are the easiest

Alleen Brown: Yeah. And I

think, you know, like, like you noted, they counted I think three killings in the past year in the entire continent of Africa out of 124 that they, they tracked, you know? I just seriously doubt that that’s it in the entire continent, you know? And in terms of Palestine, they did address, their lack of tracking of, um, killings of, Palestinian land defenders because, you know, there’s a strong argument to be made that m- most Palestinians fighting for their land are, you know, land defenders and environmental defenders as much as many of the people that are being tracked,

you by, by this organization in, in Latin America.

So in 2024, they d- Global Witness did address this. So they said, “The resulting violence and mass displacement caused by breakdowns in the rule of law and the fracturing of [00:12:00] civic spaces makes recording violations against land and environmental defenders a challenge.”

Basically, the idea is that in these conflict zones, it’s just kind of too hard to track.

Amy Westervelt: Mm-hmm

Alleen Brown: But you know, for the record, at least 74,000 people, um, have been killed, Palestinians, at least, at least in, in Gaza since October 7, 2023, um, you know, in this US-funded Israeli genocide. Um, so something to just have in mind.

Amy Westervelt: Ja

Nina Lakhani: I would agree with you. I think every single Palestinian is a l- is a, is a land rights defender, right? Because that’s ultimately what

this

is about.

Amy Westervelt: Ja

Nina Lakhani: And, um, you know, I wrote a chap- a chapter for a book on the genocide called Ecocide in Gaza, and I interviewed a Bedouin farmer, um, for that book.

And I remember he said to me, you know, I will never leave my land because I love my land like I love

my

children.

Amy Westervelt: Mm

Nina Lakhani: And it’s, um, that, you know, the, the Pal- the Palestinians are their [00:13:00] land, right? That is who they are. Um, and that’s why Israel has, um, absolutely obliterated Gaza, right? Because they know

that

land without Palestinians isn’t Palestine, you know?

And so, um, yeah, there’s, uh, it’s, it- they are, and so yeah, I would agree with you. I think it’s like a huge gaping hole, Africa as well, you

know

Amy Westervelt: Ja

Nina Lakhani: And so we have to sort of just bear all of that in mind, but still 124, you know, land and environmental defenders we know were assassinated last year for defending their basic rights.

Amy Westervelt: Yeah. Yeah. So Nina, tell us a little bit about what’s been going on in Honduras recently. I know Trump has pardoned the former president. That’s kicked off a whole bunch of, of issues. What’s happening in Honduras right now and, who are the Garifuna? What are, what’s going on with them?

Nina Lakhani: So the Garifuna are the, Afro-Indigenous people. They are, are rooted in the island of Saint Vincent. They are [00:14:00] survivors of, um, West Africa slave ships, uh, who then mixed with the Indigenous people of Saint Vincent and then have settled on the islands and mainland of So- Central America more than 200 years ago. They have deep ancestral ties which have been recognized, um, and confirmed by all sorts of international bodies, UNESCO, the International Court of Human Rights, you know. And so– And they’re one of seven Indigenous groups, communities in, um, Honduras. So the Garifuna, specifically and the Lenca people, which, um, Berta Cáceres, who was an Indigenous, um, defender and an incredible political analyst who was murdered 10 years ago in 2016, March 2016. They were two of the sort of communities that really, led a lot of the resistance after the 2009 coup in Honduras, right? And so in summer of 2009, a man called Mel Zelaya, who was a sort of reformist, who was absolutely hated by the right-wing [00:15:00] elites of Honduras, the neocons of the US, Hillary Clinton in particular, because he was buying oil of Hugo Chávez, and he was ousted in this sort of, in a coup that was orchestrated by this sort of right-wing elite of religious, military, economic, political leaders. And, um, and that ushered in this very right-wing, um, pro-business political party called the National Party. And very, very quickly, like I’m talking within a year or two, Honduras became one of the most dangerous places on the planet outside an official war zone. It became the most dangerous place for land and environmental defenders per capita, and it also, and this isn’t a coincidence, became the place where 80% of the cocaine en route to the US was transiting through, right? So this is all happening in the same time.

I mean, the National Party came in and de- literally declared Honduras open for business, and they started selling off their coastlines, their [00:16:00] minerals, their, um, forests, um, s- rivers for dams to the highest bidder, international bidders, right, who would generally work with then local el- wealthy, um, partners, aided by the military, aided by sort of international banking, et cetera.

Um, so I first went to Honduras and first met Berta Cáceres and the Garifuna leaders like Miriam Miranda in the, in, uh, on election day in

2013, right? And I remember really clearly, you know, Berta was there warning international observers about the sort of targeted assassinations that were happening at the time. And that was the election that, um, a guy called Juan Orlando Hernández, um, this sort of super Zionist, evangelical, um, authoritarian leader who’d been actually the head of Congress, was elected in pa- elected as president, and he stayed in power for eight years, right? And during that time, Berta was assassinated.

I mean, you know, I mean, the criminalization and the, the violence against the [00:17:00] whole, all of civil society was really just horrific, but really targeted against, you know, anyone resisting this sort of, um, this sort of extractive neoliberal project. And in that period, hundreds of thousands of Hondurans left and tried to reach the US because of the insecurity, because, you know, of the corruption, because of the violence that was happening. Um, so h- he stays in power for eight years. He leaves power and, very soon after that, he is indicted by the Southern District, District of New York

on

arms trafficking and drug trafficking charges. By this time, his brother, Tony Hernández, who was a member of Congress, had, had also been indicted and I think had already been convicted. And so then he, so he’s tried in New York, Juan Orlando Hernández, and he receives, he’s found guilty and receives a 45-year sentence for trafficking, like, shitloads of conc- cocaine into the US. All right? Um, so he’s in [00:18:00] prison. Um, fast-forward a year or so, in comes our dear leader, Trump, or your dear leader, Trump, and at the end of last year, just weeks before the US launches this illegal operation to abduct Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela justified by the fact they said he was a drug trafficker, Trump commutes Juan Orlando Hernández’s sentence, a 45-year sentence for drug, for bringing hu- huge amounts of drugs

into the US, commutes his sentence, and he pops off back to Honduras, right? At the same time, Trump interferes in the general election at the end of last year, and he backs a National Party candidate, this guy who’s a construction magnate, who was a member of Congress as well. And while he was a member of Congress, his name appeared in the Panama Papers, if we remember those. That was this massive trough of sort of leaked papers about high-level officials, who were linked to sort of shady

bank accounts in different countries.

So, you know, we get to [00:19:00] January, and Juan Orlando’s back and by all accounts, back to controlling what’s happening in the country. The National Party are back in power, including a whole bunch of people who have alleged ties, to organized crime. And then what we see in March is the Inter-American Court of Human Rights issues its fourth, um, favorable sentence for the Garifuna community, and this time it relates to this archipelago called the Cayos Cochinos, which is like maybe 40, 50 miles out into the Caribbean. Which the government had several years before basically said they were converting it into a national park and started leasing this land out to, um, the reality show Survivor, the Spanish version of the reality show, s- um, Survivor. And so the Inter-American Court says absolutely not.

This ancestral land is, you know, the Garifunas’, the communities that live there, they have [00:20:00] fishing rights. There’s also a whole load of like the endangered species, including turtles that breed out there, and that any use of that, the archipelago, has to be done in conjunction with the Garifuna people, right?

So that’s March of this year, and what we saw happen two or three months ago is that five Garifuna leaders were arrested and they were charged with these trumped up charges of usurpación, so cri- um, criminal, trespass. And And so the Garifunas decide that that’s it. They have tried everything. They’ve gone, they’ve done everything legally. They’ve, you know, they’ve gone to the courts and no one is complying with the sentences. So they set up this massive encampment in front of the Supreme Court of Justice in Tegucigalpa in the capital. Um, um, and, and they’ve been there for two months now. They also have two other encampments. One where survivor is filming just in that area there, and another where the five leaders were arrested and charged a couple of [00:21:00] months ago. So that’s where we’re at now and that’s sort of what I wanted to talk to Karen Spring who is the coordinator of the Honduras Solidarity Network, who’s been, you know, involved and working and living in Honduras for many, many years now.

Um, so yeah, so that’s why we invited her on today.

Amy Westervelt: Awesome. All right. Just before we get to Karen, we do have a little bit of video showing the Garifuna coming up against the Survivor reality TV crew which is… It’s unbelievable.

Video: En estos momentos nos encontramos aquí en un plantón en lo que es el archipiélago Cayos Cochinos. Como todos saben, Honduras recibió una sentencia, ¿va? Por la Corte Interamericana de los Derechos Humanos por violentar el derecho a la consulta libre, previa e informada.

Es decir, también por violentar el derecho a la alimentación. Durante laaa creación del monumento y el archipiélago Cayos Cochinos han desaparecido más de trece personas y otros han sobrevivido para contar la historia. Las [00:22:00] filmaciones de los reality shows no se les consultó a las comunidades, pese que el año pasado que vinieron a, a grabar para esta temporada, se les hizo saber a ellos de que si venían, la comunidad iba a venir a hacer un plantón de manera indefinida.

Amy Westervelt: Tell us what’s going on here

Nina Lakhani: So this is the Spanish version of the reality show, which by the way is absolutely massive in

Amy Westervelt: Ja.

Nina Lakhani: Latin America, right? Yeah, it’s like, you know, the number one

reality show. So in spite of this international court sentence, the crew just turn up as usual that, as, as, as they have been doing for like several years now, and just start filming this show.

And it’s just, I mean, it just shows utter, lack of rule of law and just the guaranteed impunity that there is, right, for anyone that has money and power in

this

country.

Amy Westervelt: Yeah

Nina Lakhani: So what we’re looking at is now, um, some local leaders filming the Survivor crew filming and saying, “We’re just asking you [00:23:00] to comply with international law, right?

You have no right to be here. This is what the court has said, and like we are just asking folk, you know, you to just comply with the law, to, to follow the law.”

Amy Westervelt: And it’s really something. Uh, just a, a plug for watching this on YouTube so that you can see this video, because the, the Survivor crew is, like, filming the community leaders as they’re saying this stuff, and there, there’s just, like, no reaction. They’re just like, “Uh-huh. Mm-hmm. Okay.” Like, it’s really, really galling.

Um, anyway, yeah. Okay. Let’s hear your conversation with Karen after this quick break.

[00:24:00]

Nina Lakhani: ​ Karen Spring, welcome to The Spill. Um, you’re the co-coordinator of the Honduras Solidarity Network, and, um, you got in touch a couple of weeks ago about the awful situation facing the Afro-Indigenous Garifuna people in Honduras. Can you start off by just setting the scene for us?

Um, what’s been happening in Honduras since the National Party came back to power in January, and since a convicted drug-trafficking ex-president, Juan Orlando Hernández, was released by Trump?

Karen: Okay. Well, thank you so much, Nina, for inviting me. Um, basically, since the beginning of this year, late January,

the new government of Honduras,

led by Nasry Tito Asfura, has taken power in Honduras, and what we’ve seen and what we’re seeing is

basically a return to what Honduras was like prior [00:25:00] to the extradition of the former president, Juan Orlando Hernandez.

And so what do I mean by that? Basically, Honduras is returning to what many called for 12 years

a narco-state,

and certain elements of that narco state are

coming to surface again. They’re being resurrected.

And what I mean by this as well is that the same model, the same economic model that targeted

land defenders, human rights defenders, lawyers that spoke out against mega projects, mega extractive projects around the country, are once again being targeted by a whole series of actions, including laws, including policies, and the remilitarization of Honduran society.

And so within this context,

there’s lots of social organizing happening and mobilization to

resist and to stop this once again, the resurrection of this [00:26:00] model

led by a state that has a long history of targeting

opponents and of criminalizing land and human rights defenders.

Nina Lakhani: Okay. So in, um, early August, uh, the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras, which is OFRANEH, in its Spanish acronym, um, and it’s the main,- organization for the Garifuna people, um, set up a protest camp in front of the Supreme Court in the capital Tegucigalpa, which they’ve called For the Life of the Garifuna People. Um, so, so Tegucigalpa is a long way from Garifuna territory on the Caribbean coast. Can you tell us why they have set up this encampment now and what are their demands?

Karen: So this encampment is a really, um, important element of, uh, actions that OFRANEH, the Afro-Indigenous organization, is taking to demand

the state of Honduras fulfill its international obligations. [00:27:00] For years, OFRANEH has been fighting to have their ancestral land rights all across the Caribbean coast respected by the state of Honduras.

They’ve filed so many different legal motions and actions in Honduras.

They’ve taken the struggle internationally to international courts, like the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

To date, they have received four sentences by that court that demand that the state of Honduras respect the Inter-American Court sentences and their ancestral land rights, and they’ve simply been ignored.

so recently, um, at the beginning of July, there was attack against

another Garifuna community in the beautiful area called Tela Bay, specifically in the community of San Juan.

And the state went in, hundreds of police officers, to try to evict the Garifuna from this land that they were recovering,

as in they decided that they were no longer [00:28:00]

going to tolerate that a wealthy businessman was taking this port– this piece of land right in front of the beach, and they were gonna go and recover it because it’s their ancestral title, the Inter-American Court recognizes their right to that land,

so they’ve decided to go in and recover it.

In response, the state sent hundreds of police to evict them, and they criminalized these five Garifuna leaders from the same community.

So this is sort of the direct,

the

encampment is the direct response to that action. But it’s part of a long-standing pattern over decades of the lack of respect for ancestral land rights and the targeting of Garifuna leaders that are just simply trying to protect their cultural integrity and their survival along the coast of Honduras.

So the encampment — what they did,

OFRANEH brought several hundreds of people from Garifuna communities to set up camp, basically, in front of the Supreme Court in Tegucigalpa

in this small [00:29:00] green space.

They are now camped out there. There’s tents all over the area. They’re cooking, collectively cooking for everybody that’s there.

They’re living there,

as in they don’t leave that area. They’re emitting communiques in response to what’s going on, how they’re being targeted, how the state continues to ignore them

not fulfilling their demands. And so that is the purpose of this encampment, and it’s

as an escalation by OFRANEH to say, “Listen, we’ve done everything.

We’ve followed the national laws. We’ve followed international laws. We have no other choice now. We are going to stay and live here in front of the Supreme Court until we’re heard by the state of Honduras.”

Nina Lakhani: Um, can we talk a little bit about this case you know, which has sort of triggered, I guess, the encampment? Um, tell me a little bit about the family or the businessman involved, and also l- the, the, the charges against the five Garifuna leaders, they’ve been charged with usurpación, which I think the b- the best English translation that I’ve come up with is, like, aggravated trespass. [00:30:00] So people being, like, accused of trespassing on their own land, which is happening all over Honduras. So just tell us a bit more about this businessman and, um, his family.

Karen: So this plot of land that is part of this conflict, um, is right on the beautiful Caribbean beach. I mean, it’s an absolutely gorgeous piece of land.

It’s part of their ancestral title.

and so this businessman, like businessmen from the US, from Canada, from Europe, Mexico, um, they are just so taken back by the beauty of

Hondurans’ Caribbean coast that this wealthy family that is part of the wealthy oligarchs, as Hondurans call them, or the wealthy elite in Honduras, named the Rosenthal family, have a tourist company called Promotur.

And this

family, um, is basically claiming that they own this piece of land on very false premises that many years ago they, they, [00:31:00]

purchased the land from someone that was renting the land. And so there’s very clear manipulation

of the law going on here, where,

they’re basically ignoring land

titles, um, to the convenience of this wealthy businessman or this wealthy business family, the Rosenthal family.

And I think what’s interesting about the Rosenthal family is this, that like the former president, Juan Orlando Hernández, who was involved in drug trafficking,

the Rosenthal family as well was involved in drug trafficking. And in fact, three members of their family faced very serious accusations and charges by the New York Southern District Court of New York on

drug-related charges, mostly money laundering charges,

in that they were,

they owned a, one of the largest banks in Honduras, Grupo Continental or Continental Bank,

and they were using that bank to launder drug money,

for a specific cartel named Los Cachiros that operated all along the Caribbean coast of Honduras.[00:32:00]

So I think what’s important to remember about this case is that the state of Honduras has consistently, over many years, worked alongside and defended the interests of drug

traffickers like the Rosenthal family and

used the state in order to promote the interests of these very problematic, wealthy elite that are deeply involved in drug trafficking.

And that’s sort of happening all along the coast of Honduras. It’s not specific to just Tela Bay, where this one particular conflict is going on, where five Garifuna have been criminalized, but it’s happening in many different hotel, resort, golf course,

cruise ship terminals

projects that are basically promoted both in the Bay Islands, which is off the north coast of Honduras, and then also across the Caribbean coast on maina- mainland Honduras.

Nina Lakhani: Yeah, and, um, the Rosenthal family also, um, were, like a lot of the elites in Honduras,

you know, have their tentacles everywhere, right? Banking, land, um, other natural [00:33:00] resources, and the media as well, right? I see the parallel then there with what’s happening in the US, right?

Just this concentration of power. And the reason I mention that is that we’re seeing, Garifuna leaders, being criminalized in the mainstream media as well.

So, you know, their defense of their land, their ancestral rights are being equated to being sort of, like organized crime almost, you know. Can you talk a little bit

about that?

Karen: Sure, and I think that that intention has– the attempt to link the Garifuna to organized crime also, you know to terrorism

is, something that is very, uh, important right now, both in the regional context given,

Donald Trump’s alleged or allegations that they’re attacking narco-terrorism across the region and using that

justification to invade countries, to bomb boats, to carry out joint operations in multiple parts of Latin America.

But in Honduras, as a result of that [00:34:00] same regional politics, this attack on alleged narco-terrorism,

the Honduran government has been modifying laws since January of this year to basically redefine what being associated with terrorism means. And so OFRANEH, along with the social movement, has been raising alarm to the fact that now the government of Honduras has given itself the ability to declare any group

a terrorist organization.

And so there’s a lot of concern that these mainstream media attempts, which are driven by racism, by ignorance,

is this attempt to link

OFRANEH, the Afro-Indigenous people that are defending their land rights and their cultural integrity,

to terrorist organizations, to narco-terrorism, which I think has long been part of the war on drugs and long been part of this,

to criminalize social movements across Latin America.

Nina Lakhani: Yeah. Um, you mentioned that the, um, the Garifuna people have, um, had four favorable [00:35:00] sentences from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and one of those relates to the Cayos Co- Cochinos, um, archipelago, right? And I wanted to talk a little bit about the reality show Survivor because, um, the Spanish language version has for years now been, been filmed on, on, on one of the islands. What did the court say about that, and what’s happening there right now?

Karen: Sure. So, I mean, I think it’s really important to set the scene, especially given, like, the topic of your, of your podcast or of your broadcast, is that, um, Cayos Cochinos is this absolutely breathtaking place. It’s right about 30 kilometers off the main coast of Honduras, right in the Caribbean.

It’s actually a whole bunch of little islands and keys all together, and it’s surrounded by beautiful turquoise waters that are just surrounded by this coral reef.

And it’s actually been declared a World Cultural Heritage site by UNESCO. And so it’s no wonder that

television shows like [00:36:00] Survivor, who have spent 20 years or something filming this reality

show in this area, is so interested in this specific region.

But also it’s a region that is like,

needs to be protected.

And so the state of Honduras has tried multiple times to evict and get rid of the Garifuna communities, some of which have long lived on these small little keys and these islands.

They’ve tried to evict them from the area using “ecological

protection,” natural reserve laws, to limit their ability to have both land rights, but also to protect their own habitat and to fish in the area as well.

And so since Survivor started filming recently, I believe they started in August or July, which they have every year,

basically in coordination with the wealthy elite,

international and national,

that basically say that they are protecting the Cayos Cochinos region.

They started filming, and because of this [00:37:00] new Inter-American Court sentence that was, uh-

basically handed down by the court in March of this year

saying that the state of Honduras must consult the Garifuna people that live on Cayos Cochinos

in relation to their collective property rights and their participation in the administration of the protected area, and also before any television shows or tourist developments are basically carried out in this region.

And so seeing that Survivor is once again being filmed

in one of these islands and keys,

OFRANEH and the Garifuna communities that are affected have gone to set up another encampment to say,

we were not consulted.”

Survivor, they bring in a lot of people into this area.

They disrupt, um, uh, turtles that are in the region.

OFRANEH has said, “We’ve been the ones that have been protecting,

this area for so long, and we were not consulted for

for this, uh, s- reality show to be filmed in this

area.” [00:38:00] And so that’s

the purpose of this particular encampment. In fact, OFRANEH has three active encampments around the country:

One in Tegucigalpa in front of the Supreme Court, one where Survivor is being filmed in Cayos Cochinos, and another one in San Juan Tela,

areas where they’re actively resisting their dispossession by

tourist interests,

by drug trafficking interests,

and also by African palm, which is another major threat to their survival as Well,

Nina Lakhani: Miriam M-Miranda, the, the founder of, of, of OFRANEH, um, has many times said to me that Honduras is a laboratory. It’s a laboratory for extreme capitalism, for the neoliberal project. What do you, think she means by that?

Karen: I, I feel like Honduras is often a forgotten country, and because it receives such little attention, it sort of… that facilitates this, it being used as a laboratory for many extreme neoliberal policies.

So neoliberal policies. So [00:39:00] widespread dispossession by a whole range of private interests, by international or transnational capital, um, that work alongside the local wealthy elite, in a whole range of industries, a agro-industrial businesses, um, energy, whether that’s solar, whether that’s hydroelectric, mining, um, just a whole range of extractive projects.

And I think what it also is a laboratory for is the conflation of neoliberal policies with organized crime,

Karen: because Honduras has long been a narco state.

Karen: we’re seeing a resurrection of the narco state model, where

transnational capital works alongside individuals that are proven, or there’s very widespread evidence

that

they’re involved in drug trafficking or illicit interests.

And so it’s a laboratory in that sense, but it’s also a laboratory,

 for how the state can repress

the rising social movement that refuses to give up, that [00:40:00] constantly stands up against these interests and is denouncing, is putting together encampments,

that have a whole range of tactics to stop this sort of encroachment of this model.

and so it’s, it’s true, and I mean it’s, never

stopped, true. being a laboratory over many, many years. And we’re seeing it again, like basically this, uh, laboratory, um, being resurrected once again,

with this

new, uh, government. 

Nina Lakhani: Um, thi- just thinking about the Trump administration, um, you know, and, and I don’t wanna sit here and think that everything was great before Trump, because it wasn’t, and not with the Democrats and not with other pre- you know, with previous Republican administrations. But just thinking about right now when you see the very clear move towards trying to dismantle international justice, and really this, you know, a project of impunity in which wealth and power is increasingly concentrated, you know, among a very few. Like, what’s, what are the big fears [00:41:00] about this sort of Trump 2.0 project, um, for the defenders in, in Honduras and civil society more broadly?

Karen: I think probably the biggest fear is the stamp of approval that the current administration is

consistently receiving

from the Trump administration because it’s a Trump-imposed government.

Juan Orlando Hernández was released from prison. He basically evaded a 45-year prison sentence

in, in the US for

being involved in transporting over 400

into the United States, and he was released, and he’s back in the country.

And then you have his political party

back in power, um, that the evidence is

just, like,

overwhelming of their corruption, of their involvement in drug trafficking, of the repression

that they’ve used against their, the Honduran population with support from the US government. And so I think what is the most worrying is just how this whole security model, which is

fundamentally [00:42:00] about corruption and, and guaranteeing impunity, what that will mean for vulnerable populations or populations that are in resistance to

the transnational interests that are basically and ultimately being promoted by the US government.

And

so this has already led to a, a bunch of, responses and changes within

this

administration since January. I mentioned the agro-industrial law, which promotes private interests

over public interest in land. So it basically pushes aside the land rights of Afro-Indigenous individuals or communities and the small farmer communities that have long, like you said, been in resistance trying to reclaim their land.

It also means that they’re changing the definition of what being a terrorist is.

They’re returning with the mano dura, or the hard fist,

trying to a- allegedly crack down on crime, when ultimately that will mean basically sending in police and military [00:43:00] to territories,

where individuals and communities are defending their land rights or protecting their environment from large scale development projects.

And so I think that’s the biggest fear, and I think for me, as somebody that does solidarity work,

and really focuses on

bringing in pressure from internationally, is is that people are so overwhelmed by how bad the state of the world is,

and how corrupt, and how,

just the deterioration of sort of any attempts to promote or give the idea that there’s a value in the rule of law.

It’s very difficult to draw attention to what’s going on in a small little place like Honduras because people are just so overwhelmed with the state of the world.

And so that really puts already vulnerable populations in an even more vulnerable position,

and it’s very hard to move people to care about these issues because of how low the bar is being l- lowered constantly [00:44:00] by

this global superpower that has no respect for the rule of law, multilateralism,

social justice or justice in general.

Nina Lakhani: Yeah, and I think this is a challenge that we as journalists face too, right? It’s like, trying to tell stories and explain to people why, um, the sort of the violations of people’s rights in these, this archipelago in the Caribbean off the coast of Honduras matters. Why it matters for all of us, right?

Like, and, and, you know, there is obviously the solidarity and the empathy and the human rights part of it, but also the protection of, you know, ecosystems and our oceans and land, you know, is hu- is hugely important to everyone, like, globally, right? We, we’re all interconnected, and so, you know, violations of human rights but also environmental rights and sort of, you know, ecocide and all these things are so deeply connected.

And I think the challenge for us, and like we’re really sort of thinking about this all the time at Drilled, you [00:45:00] know, is that how do we, you know, how do we explain to people why it matters? How one- how a, you know, resistance by one community in a tiny place you’ve maybe never heard of, you know, is connected to, to, to your life, right?

To sort of the air that you breathe, to your energy prices, to, to, to global heating, to the extreme weather that we’re seeing all over the planet, you know? And I think that’s the challenge that we’re, you know, that we’re definitely in right

now.

Karen: Absolutely, and I, I wanted to add as well to that, I mean, the climate w- it just, like, completely connects us all. There’s just no borders with climate, the climate crisis. And,

And,

protecting those areas like Cayos Cochinos, like the Caribbean coast of Honduras or anywhere else in the world is, is all part of that broader, uh, struggle to protect

the climate. But also,

I think one of the things for me that is the biggest connection for folks internationally to Honduras is that generally a lot of people will visit Honduras,

and they’ll buy property in Honduras and not realizing that they’re actually getting [00:46:00] involved in this

gigantic political, corrupt mess.

And so you have lots of Canadians and USers and Mexicans and

Europeans that purchase land, or they see these list- this cheap land on this beautiful Caribbean coast

and they’re like, “Oh, let’s go invest there.

let’s go on a cruise ship there or

a,

a cruise ship tour there.

I’ve been there ’cause, ‘

like, oh, my friend has property there.”

And so they don’t realize that they’re getting involved in these,

like, very difficult land c-

land

conflicts, and they end up losing their investments, or they lose their lands. And so that’s something that I constantly am hearing about

where people are saying, “Oh, we didn’t know. We didn’t know that this was going on.”

And it’s just that’s why you investigate before you invest somewhere. You’re going to lose your investment. And so

there’s so many connections.

Nina Lakhani: Yeah. If it seems too good to be true, it

probably is. I think that’s

Karen: Yes.

Nina Lakhani: a good lesson. Um, um, I just wanted to finish by, with this, Karen. I mean, so [00:47:00] we met, um, for the first time at the end of 2013.

It was election day, the election where Juan Orlando Hernández c- first came to power. We met, um, I remember it really clearly. You had dengue fever. You didn’t know that you, that you were sick. And that was the first time I met Berta Cáceres, and I remember she was addressing a group of election observers, international election observers, and warning them, you know, about the dire situation that communities, social leaders, um, were facing in Honduras and, you know, and, you know, really urging them not to look away.

Um, Berta was then murdered in 2016, you know, and, you know, the, it caused an international uproar. Um, I, and I wonder, you know, 10 years after her assassination, I mean, uh, the, a lot’s happened, a lot’s changed in the world. The National Party are back in power. Juan Orlando Hernández was in power when Berta got murdered. Um, including a four-year term for the, you know, progressive [00:48:00] government, in between, you know, How would you say the situation for, um, environmental and land rights defenders has changed, if at all, in that period?

Karen: Well, I think you mentioned that,

there

was a s-

progressive government in power for four years prior to this current government took power in January in Honduras, and like progressive governments all across Latin America,

they face extreme difficulties in being able to change the structural issues that affect so many Latin American countries.

And that’s not really excusing them because they make very significant mistakes. They repeat the same problematic patterns that they themselves denounce before they get to power.

But I think for a while in Honduras,

for the four years that there was a progressive government, I think spaces were a little bit more open to dialogue with the state

and for communities to be able to achieve

some, uh, of their goals and of their demands that they’ve had for many [00:49:00] years.

So I do think that to a certain degree, political power can be very useful for creating spaces for critical voices, for voices that are seeking to be included in the political process. But again, I think that since January with this new sort of far-right or conservative right government that has taken power, imposed by Donald Trump,

we’re going back to seeing that Honduras is once again a dangerous place to be an environmentalist, to be a land defender,

and it’s very concerning.

And so

things change,

but,

uh, and they could change again for the better. But, I think it’s a very difficult situation, very similar to what Berta was, uh, cautioning people and raising the alarm about,

uh, before she– three years before she– was murdered.

Nina Lakhani: Thank you very much, Karen Spring, co-coordinator of the Holi- um, Honduras Solidarity Network.

Karen: Thank you so much, Nina

Nina Lakhani: [00:50:00] And thanks for listening to The Spill. We’ll be back in your feeds next Friday.

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