Honduran Human Rights Activist to Speak in Peace Dale

Witness for Peace -New England and Tomaquag Museum are sponsoring an Evening with Gaspar Sanchez at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of South County on November 7th at 7:00pm at 27 North Road Peace Dale RI. His talk is titled "Uniting to Resist Attacks on our Land and our Identities: Building on the Queer Indigenous Movement in the Americas".

In 2003, Gaspar Sánchez dropped out of the fifth grade and became a
full-time member of the Council of Indigenous and Popular
Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) learning about its
anti-patriarchal, anti-racist and anti-capitalist struggles from its
beloved founder and indigenous feminist leader, Berta Cáceres. Since
2014 Sánchez has served on COPINH’s leadership team as the Sexual
Diversity & Rights Equality Coordinator. COPINH is the first
indigenous organization in Latin America to establish LGBTI issues as
a pillar of its work. Sánchez also hosts a radio program, Los
Colores de Wiphala, that discusses human rights with an emphasis on the LGBTI community.
He leads community trainings on indigenous rights, territorial
defense, and protecting Mother Nature’s common goods under siege by
extractivist projects. He accompanies legal processes in support of
indigenous humans rights defenders and against state actors and
corporations that have committed crimes in Lenca territories. Sánchez
is a popular educator with COPINH’s Tomás García Formation School
which works to shape the next generation of young indigenous
leadership. He also serves as a spiritual guide for the Lenca people
in their collective efforts to recuperate historical memory through
processes of life, land defense, and ancestral practices. Finally,
Sánchez has represented COPINH all over the world from Mexico, Cuba,
Venezuela, and Brazil, to the United States and the United Nations.

This speaker is of importance to Rhode Islanders. Our country provides significant military aid and training to Honduras. According to Ben Norton of AlterNet.com in 2016 "since 2010, the U.S. has given approximately $200 million in police and military aid to Honduras. The regime also benefits from the U.S.'s $750 million Alliance for Prosperity fund." Honduras is governed by a regime that came to power in 2009 by military coup and since, human rights' violations have increased and a virtual state of impunity exists for those crimes. Representative Cicilline has co-sponsored HR-1299, a bill that would stop US military aid and training until changes are made in Honduras on human rights-Representative Langevin has not co-sponsored this bill. United States' military support for the corrupt and repressive government in Honduras, along with its economic and development policies, contribute to the flux of refugees and immigrants from this country.

I had a chance to meet Gaspar Sanchez on a Witness for Peace delegation to Honduras in June of 2016- meeting him in La Esperanza, where Berta Caceres was assassinated, three months earlier. Gaspar led our delegation to the village of Rio Blanco, where indigenous Lenca people have opposed, since 2011, the Aqua Zarca hydro-dam project on their sacred Gualcarque River. Berta, an internationally-known indigenous, environmental activist, led the opposition to this project which had failed to get local approval and support. Berta's activism led to her assassination but Gaspar and the Lenca people continue to organize. This talk gives an opportunity to hear from the people who are struggling to protect their land and rights in Central America, in spite of opposition from a corrupt and repressive government that has US support.