Category Archives: Colonialism and Resistance

Land rights defender Leocadio Juracán arrested in Guatemala

Jim Hodgson

Friends and allies of Leocadio Juracán, Agrarian Reform Coordinator of the Campesino Committee of the Highlands (CCDA), are protesting his arrest Wednesday as he was about to fly to South Africa for an international conference.

“He is being criminalized for his work as a land and human rights defender,” said the Maritimes-Guatemala Breaking The Silence Network (BTS) in an urgent action request. He faces multiple charges, including aggravated trespass (usurpación agravada), directly related to his advocacy for Indigenous and farming communities across Guatemala.

(More details of the urgent action request and of Leocadio’s arrest follow below.)

Leocadio continued talking with reporters even as police escorted him from the airport and into a waiting room vehicle. Right: details of the conference he was to attend in South Africa.

I worked with Leocadio and other members of CCDA in May 2022 and March 2023, travelling with them to communities in Quiché and Izabal departments that face threats from people or companies purporting to be the true land-owners. In those communities and in scores of others across Guatemala, CCDA works with Indigenous and small-farmer communities to document their history on the land and to submit legal justification for their claims.

Leocadio and other CCDA members are known in many parts of Canada because they work with coffee farmers whose product is sent to roasters linked to Café Justicia in British Columbia and Just Us! in Atlantic Canada in a “fair trade plus” arrangement.

More details of the BTS Urgent Action request (including a template for letters in Spanish):

On August 13, Leocadio Juracán, Agrarian Reform Coordinator of the Campesino Committee of the Highlands (CCDA), was detained at La Aurora Airport as he was leaving the country to participate in a Translocal Social Movement Learning conference in South Africa. 

Leocadio is being criminalized for his work as a land and human rights defender. He is currently facing multiple charges, including Aggravated Trespass (usurpación), directly related to his advocacy for Indigenous and campesino communities.

We need your immediate action:

With the following Canadian officials copied:

In your message, please call on them to:

  • Ensure his protection until such time as he is released.
  • Follow recent UN Special Rapporteur advice to enact an immediate moratorium on evictions and grant amnesty for all criminalized land defenders.
  • End criminalization of the members and leadership of Indigenous and campesino communities and organizations.

Many of these government officials are Spanish speaking. If possible, write this letter in Spanish. Otherwise, you can also send it in English.

If you’d like to send it in Spanish, you may say:

Me dirijo a usted para exigir que:

  • Liberen inmediatamente a Leocadio Juracán.
  • Garanticen su protección hasta el momento de su liberación.
  • Sigan las recomendaciones recientes del Relator Especial de la ONU de declarar una moratoria inmediata de los desalojos forzados y de otorgar la amnistía a todos los defensores criminalizados.
  • Pongan fin a la criminalización de los miembros y líderes de las comunidades y organizaciones indígenas y campesinas.

After you write this email, please share with several of your friends and contacts. Thank you so much for your urgent support to help get Leocadio Juracán free.

Leocadio Juracán, March 21, 2023, speaking with the people of an Indigenous Q’eqchi’ community known as Macho Creek near Guatemala’s Atlantic coast. (Photo: Jim Hodgson)

Leocadio Juracán, campesino leader and former congress member, arrested

Prensa Comunitaria

Leocadio Juracán Salome, leader of the Highlands Committee of Small Farmers (CCDA), was detained Wednesday morning (Aug. 13) at La Aurora Airport in the Guatemalan capital as he was preparing to travel to South Africa for an international conference.

According to his defense attorneys, the crimes for which Juracán was arrested are aggravated trespass (usurpación agravada) and causing forest fires.

“Today, as I was preparing to travel to participate in this conference, I was arbitrarily detained at approximately 11:05 a.m. at La Aurora International Airport,” said the former congress member from the now-defunct Convergencia party.

Juracán asked his family to remain calm and told his fellow CCDA members that he is proud of their struggles “because these repressive practices by the State and corrupt officials only demonstrate that they cannot stop our just struggles with criminalization alone.”

The news of his arrest has generated expressions of solidarity from various individuals and sectors. The CCDA, the organization of which he is a member, stated that this arrest is an act of criminalization and prosecution against those who defend land, territory, and social justice and demanded his immediate release.

Representative and campesino leader

When he was elected representative for Convergencia (2015-2019), Juracán supported campesino organizations and other social sectors in their demands. In March 2017, along with then-representative Sandra Morán, he filed a preliminary lawsuit against former President Jimmy Morales in the Hogar Seguro case, which was unsuccessful.

Juracán remains one of the representatives of the CCDA, an organization dedicated to promoting rural development for Indigenous and small-farmer communities. Founded in 1982 during the military dictatorships, the organization was formally established in 1989.

Currently, CCDA supports Indigenous communities and land defenders facing issues of eviction and criminalization in several departments of the country, including El Estor, Izabal, and Cobán, Alta Verapaz. …

From Bogotá, the Global South charges Israel with genocide

A two-day meeting this week in the Colombian capital ended with renewed commitment to pursue accountability for Israeli abuses in Gaza, including by preventing the transfer of weapons to Israel.

As the event drew to a close Wednesday (July 16), Colombian President Gustavo Petro (above) told participants, “Gaza is simply an experiment by the ultra-rich to show the impoverished people of the world how they will respond to humanity’s rebellion.”

Petro also distanced himself further from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which in 2022 had designated Colombia as a “non-member strategic ally.” 

“What are we doing in NATO, if its principal leaders are with the genocide?” he asked. “We must leave.”

A coalition known as The Hague Group organised the summit. It was born in January last year through the help of Progressive International (PI), an organization founded in 2020 to unite, organize, and mobilize progressive forces around the world. PI called the Bogotá meeting the “most ambitious multilateral action since the start of Gaza genocide 21 months ago.”

Jointly convened by the governments of Colombia and South Africa as co-chairs, the Hague Group also includes Bolivia, Cuba, Indonesia, Iraq, Libya, Malaysia, Namibia, Nicaragua, Oman and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. At least 18 other countries, plus the United Nations and the World Council of Churches, sent representatives. Qatar and Egypt, which are overseeing negotiations between Hamas and the Israeli government, attended.

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which has said women and children make up more than half of the dead. At least 90 were killed on Thursday (July 16), including those who were crushed at an Israeli-controlled food distribution site. Holy Family Church also came under attack, sparking criticism and new calls for peace from Pope Leo XIV and from the World Council of Churches.

During Tuesday morning’s opening event, various officials spoke, calling for an end to Israel’s attacks on Gaza. Colombia’s foreign minister, Rosa Yolanda Villavicencio, said during her morning address that Israel’s attacks constitute an unequivocal “genocide.”

Another key participant was Francesca Albanese (above), the U.N. special rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories. She denounced the inaction of the international community. She accused the West of justifying Israeli actions as the “right to defense” and said the vetos in the U.N. Security Council “protect war crimes” carried out in the sight of all.

“Palestine has changed global consciousness, drawing a clear line between those who oppose genocide and those who accept it or are part of it,” she said. Albanese was recently sanctioned by the US for her outspoken criticism of Israel’s actions.

“We believe in protagonism, not supplication,” said Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla, the executive secretary of The Hague Group. “Today marks an end to the era of the impunity and the beginning of collective state action by governments of conscience.”

The group members committed to implementing six measures immediately through their domestic legal and administrative systems to break the ties of complicity with Israel’s campaign of devastation in Palestine. They set September 20 as a date for other states to join them, coinciding with the 80th U.N. General Assembly. Consultations with capitals across the world are now ongoing.

“We hereby announce the following measures,” the Joint Statement on the Conclusion of the Emergency Ministerial Conference on Palestine reads, “to be adopted based on states’ domestic legal and legislative frameworks:”

  • Prevent the provision or transfer of arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel…
  • Prevent the transit, docking, and servicing of vessels at any port…. in all cases where there is a clear risk of the vessel being used to carry arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel
  • Prevent the carriage of arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel on vessels bearing our flag… and ensure full accountability, including de-flagging, for non-compliance with this prohibition.
  • Commence an urgent review of all public contracts, to prevent public institutions and funds from supporting Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian Territory and entrenching its unlawful presence.
  • Comply with obligations to ensure accountability for the most serious crimes under international law, through robust, impartial and independent investigations and prosecutions at national or international levels, to ensure justice for all victims and the prevention of future crimes.
  • Support universal jurisdiction mandates, as and where applicable in national legal frameworks and judiciaries, to ensure justice for victims of international crimes committed in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

“These 12 states have taken a momentous step forward,” said Albanese about the joint statement. “The clock is now ticking for states—from Europe to the Arab world and beyond—to join them.”

The full joint statement is here.

Complete text of Albanese’s remarks is here.

Vatican’s Jubilee commission urges systemic change as it launches new debt relief report

A Vatican-backed report authored by more than 30 prominent economists calls for urgent action and systemic reforms to address the global debt and development crises of our times.

The group, convened by the late Pope Francis for this Jubilee year, provides recommendations on debt relief and economic policy.

What follows is (mostly) from a news releases today by Jubilee USA and the Initiative for Policy Dialogue at Columbia University:
“This report is a blueprint to solve the current global debt crisis, prevent future economic crises and create an economy that radically reduces poverty,” said Eric LeCompte, executive director of the Jubilee USA Network and a Vatican advisor who is at the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences (PASS) for the report launch. 

“While debt relief and a just economy are at the center of Catholic teaching, this is the first report convened by a Pope that focuses on technical recommendations to achieve an economy that serves everyone,” he added.
Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and former Argentine Minister of the Economy, Martín Guzmán, led the work of the expert group.

The report “seeks to contribute to a comprehensive rethinking of the global rules governing finance, taxation, trade, and the sharing of knowledge,” said PASS. “At its heart lies a clear and urgent goal: to help build a global economy that serves people, especially the most vulnerable, and truly leaves no one behind.”
Pope Francis reiterated the interfaith calls of Pope Benedict and Pope John Paul II on debt relief and economics, making these issues the focus of the Christian holy year of Jubilee 2025. Pope Leo XIV continues the efforts of his predecessors. 

Twenty-five years ago in Jubilee 2000, over $100 billion in international debt was cancelled, but a lack of structural reform, combined with recent world events, resulted in systemic vulnerabilities that are now undermining hard-won gains. 

The time for new Jubilee action is now.

Recommendations include:

  • Improve debt restructuring: Change multilateral institution policies and legislation in key jurisdictions so that creditors and debtor governments are newly incentivized to agree to more timely and sustainable debt restructurings.
  • End bailouts to private creditors: Multilateral institutions including the International Monetary Fund should change their policies and practices to support sustainable recoveries, not de facto bailouts of private creditors or crippling austerity.
  • Strengthen domestic policies: Developing countries should more extensively use capital account regulations to discourage destabilizing flows and create a more stable environment for long-term investments and should invest in structural transformation.
  • Enhance transparency: All should support financial policies that are transparent and have broad societal support.
  • Reimagine global finance: All should support a comprehensive change in global financing models to drive financing for sustainable development, including lending that supports long-term growth.

The report’s findings will be discussed at the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development in Seville, Spain, June 30-July 3 and other global gatherings where the global debt and development crises will be high on the agenda.
“Developing countries spent a record $1.4 trillion paying debt in 2023 and too many countries spend more on paying debt than they do on the urgent needs of their people,” said LeCompte who also serves on United Nations debt expert groups. “In African and low-income countries, debt payments are two-thirds higher than their combined spending on health, education and social services.”
According to the World Bank, more than 800 million people live in extreme poverty, over 100 million more than previously believed. The report calls for a range of reforms as a debt and poverty crisis that has been growing in the face of the pandemic, wars, cost-of-living and interest rate hikes rose to prominence in the agenda of global leaders in multiple forums. Proposals include greater transparency, reforms to the International Monetary Fund, changes to laws in New York and the United Kingdom which govern private sector debt, improving debt contracts and an international bankruptcy system akin to the national bankruptcy courts that exist in most countries.
“This report can move the G7, G20, IMF and United Nations to make short-term decisions to address the current crisis and lay a foundation to prevent future crises,” stated LeCompte.
“The experts who wrote this report are a critical part of the global Jubilee movement, which includes advocates in pews, development groups, conservatives, liberals and people of every faith,” shared LeCompte. 

Read or download the report here or here.

Read Pope Francis’ Jubilee 2025 debt focus speech here.