Tegucigalpa, Honduras-. Last week, environmental defender and youth leader from the southern zone of the country, Marvin Damián Castro Molina, said that he feared for his life during a meeting to review protective measures before the National Protection System, directed by Danilo Morales.
Castro was 29 years old and dedicated his human rights work to the organization and formation of youth networks in the departments of Valle and Choluteca. He was recognized for this work in the region and in the spaces of social struggle in which he participated.
According to local information, he had been missing since yesterday however at noon on Monday July 13, his lifeless body was found in the Sacamil river in the community of Agua Tibia, in the village of El Espinal, municipality of Pespire, in Choluteca.
He was buried this afternoon amidst expressions of pain and repudiation in response to the act on the part of grieving human rights defenders, without details about the crime that took the life of the youth leader who lived in Agua Tibia,
He served as president of the Pespirense Youth Network coordinated by the Pespirense Development Association- Honduras (ADEPESHN), and he coordinated the Youth Secretariat of the Environmental Social Movement of the South for Life (MASSVida).
In a conversation with Defensores en Linea, Claudia Fortína, a colleague of Marvin Damián Castro in ADEPESHN, lamented the crime against the defender and affirmed that at this moment there is no information about the crime.
Germán Chirinos, coordinator of MASSVIDA, denounced the crime and the fact that authorities were aware of the fears and threats that were presented during the review of protective measures.
Fortín and Chirinos were on the way to the cemetery where the body of Marvin Damián Castro now rests. Both lamented and had few words for what happened to their partner, demanding that the State investigate the crime.
The demand for justice was also made by the Network of Human Rights Defenders of the South (REDEHSUR) which is part of the Committee of the Families of the Detained Disappeared in Honduras (COFADEH), where some members shared spaces of social struggle with Marvin Castro, and describe him as a friendly, peaceful youth. They call on authorities to investigate the crime to identify those responsible.
It is important to note that the human rights defender was disappeared and killed after four months of quarantine to avoid infection due to the Covid-19, and that since March 16 police and military are in charge of the public security of the community under Executive Decree PCM 021-2020, however crimes have not stopped in the most dangerous country for environmental defenders according to the 2017 Global Witness report.
On June 30, COFADEH published the report “The Southern Zone, the new scenario of capitalist violence”, where a series of human rights violations are documented including persecution, threats, harassment and killings that affect communities defending common resources and the environment, and human rights defenders.
