By Naomi Bernaldez, Campaigner on Amnesty International’s Central America team
Naomi took part in the Write for Rights campaign for Juan López and created a collage using fragments from more than 15,000 letters sent from around the world.
In this article, she reflects on what it meant to carry a sample of that solidarity to Honduras and to meet Juan’s family and fellow activists.
Defending water cost him his life
Juan López was a Honduran father, husband, human rights defender and environmental activist. Since 2015, together with other members of the community of Tocoa, he had defended the Guapinol and San Pedro rivers, the forests and Carlos Escaleras Mejía National Park against mining and energy projects that threatened the ecosystem and water quality.
Juan and his colleagues founded the Tocoa Municipal Committee for the Defence of Common and Public Goods to peacefully challenge the legality of these projects. As a result of their activism, members of the Committee have faced threats, harassment, criminalization and attacks.
On 14 September 2024, Juan was killed as he was leaving a church in Tocoa. His death left an irreparable void for his family and community…
That is why Juan’s story was selected for Write for Rights, Amnesty International’s global campaign that mobilizes millions of people every year to stand in solidarity with those who have suffered human rights violations.
A message that travelled thousands of kilometres
The campaign for Juan generated 332,381 actions worldwide.
In June, I travelled with several colleagues to Tegucigalpa to deliver a message that had already travelled thousands of kilometres before we did. In our suitcases, we carried just a fraction of those actions. It was something immense: a selection from more than 15,000 letters of solidarity written for Juan’s family, his colleagues from the Committee and the Justice for the Peoples Law Firm, which represents them legally.
For months, I had watched the
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