[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1521 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
117th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1521
Affirming the importance of the survival of Garifuna culture and
identity, condemning the violent and illegal appropriation of Garifuna
territory and calling on the Government of Honduras, the Department of
State and multilateral development banks to fully comply with the
resolutions of multilateral human rights bodies which mandate the
return of Garifuna land rights, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
December 14, 2022
Ms. Bush (for herself, Ms. Omar, Ms. Schakowsky, Mr. Garcia of
Illinois, and Mr. Bowman) submitted the following resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and in addition to the
Committee on Financial Services, for a period to be subsequently
determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such
provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Affirming the importance of the survival of Garifuna culture and
identity, condemning the violent and illegal appropriation of Garifuna
territory and calling on the Government of Honduras, the Department of
State and multilateral development banks to fully comply with the
resolutions of multilateral human rights bodies which mandate the
return of Garifuna land rights, and for other purposes.
Whereas the United States and the Republic of Honduras share an important
relationship, which includes deep and long-standing economic, social,
and cultural ties;
Whereas the Afro-Indigenous Garifuna people, descendants of the Arawak Indians
of St. Vincent Island and of African castaways destined to be sold into
slavery in the Americas, are one of nine Indigenous peoples of Honduras;
Whereas the Garifuna territory that has stretched along the Caribbean coast of
Honduras since before the nation was declared independent from Spain on
September 15, 1821, is the ancestral home of the majority of the world's
Garifuna, and as such is essential to the cultural survival and well-
being of the Garifuna people;
Whereas the presence of vibrant Garifuna immigrant communities in the United
States has been recorded by oral history and scholarly research since
the early 20th century and has long contributed to the cultural
diversity that we, as a Nation, so deeply cherish;
Whereas the Government of Honduras ratified the Inter-American Convention on
Human Rights on September 5, 1977, and the Constitution of Honduras
establishes that the human rights treaties to which Honduras is a party
are considered to hold the same legal effect as the Constitution, and
therefore the judgments of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights are
binding on the Government of Honduras;
Whereas, on May 18, 2001, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO) issued a proclamation declaring the
Garifuna language and culture a ``Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible
Heritage of Humanity,'' the first proclamation of its kind in
furtherance of the United Nations Convention Concerning the Protection
of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage and the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, and on October 17, 2003, the General Conference of
UNESCO adopted the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible
Cultural Heritage;
Whereas, on March 7, 2003, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
determined in its Merit Report that the rights to personal liberty, to a
fair trial and to judicial protections, to freedom of thought and
expression and to personal integrity of the then-president of the Land
Defense Committee of the Garifuna community of Triunfo de la Cruz and
vice president of the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH)
had been violated by his arbitrary imprisonment for a period of six
years and four months, a conclusion confirmed by the judgment of the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights on February 1, 2006;
Whereas, on June 12, 2007, in response to a complaint from OFRANEH describing
the potential and already consummated illegal disenfranchisement of
Garifuna land rights facilitated by World Bank-supported projects, the
World Bank Inspection Panel found that the safeguards provided for the
project were not adequate to protect Garifuna rights to their ethnic
lands, while observing that the Garifuna communities did not have a
meaningful option to opt out of the project;
Whereas, on December 8, 2008, the Board of Directors of the International
Finance Corporation (IFC) approved a $30 million loan to the Dinant
Corporation, whose supply chain includes palm oil from plantations in
areas claimed by Garifuna communities, including Punta Piedra, despite
publicly available information implicating the company in violent land
disputes, illegal appropriation of Garifuna land, and reports of drug
trafficking on land controlled by the Dinant Corporation;
Whereas, on June 28, 2009, President Barack Obama characterized Roberto
Micheletti's assumption of the presidency of Honduras as illegal, the
Department of State subsequently determined that the events constituted
a coup d'etat, and the Organization of American States (OAS) suspended
Honduras' right to participate in the multinational treaty body on July
5, 2009, the first time Article 21 of the Inter-American Democratic
Charter was invoked, and did not reinstate Honduras's status in the OAS
until June 1, 2011;
Whereas Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) staff conducted a mission from
October 18 to 22, 2010, to advance planning for a $60 million loan to
the Honduran Ministry of Security and oversee the implementation of
ongoing security-related loans, signed a $60 million loan agreement on
June 21, 2012, with Security Minister Julian Pacheco, and signed a
second loan agreement on March 25, 2020;
Whereas the loans financed, among other Honduran security forces activities, the
creation of the new Direccion Policial de Investigaciones (DPI) of the
Honduran National Police;
Whereas in January 2011, the then-president of the Legislative Assembly of
Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, visited Puerto Castilla to announce
that the coastal areas of Colon would be designated as special
development zones (ZEDE), describing these areas, which largely consist
of Garifuna communities and territory, as unpopulated;
Whereas in May 2011, the IFC's Board of Directors approved an equity and
subordinated debt investment in Banco Ficohsa, which acted as a
financial intermediary of the IFC to provide further financing to the
Dinant Corporation following international outcry over the involvement
of that company's security forces in violence stemming from land rights
disputes, and whose supply chain includes palm oil from plantations in
areas claimed by Garifuna communities, including Punta Piedra and
Triunfo de la Cruz;
Whereas, on October 18, 2012, the Constitutional Court of Honduras annulled a
February 12, 2011, constitutional amendment adopted by the Honduran
legislature that would allow the nation to cede governance of areas of
the national territory to foreign governments or private corporations as
ZEDEs;
Whereas, on December 13, 2012, the International Commission of Jurists condemned
the dismissal of four of the five judges of the Constitutional Court of
Honduras by the nation's legislature, under the leadership of then-
President of Congress Juan Orlando Hernandez, explaining that the
legislature had no authority to carry out this action, which seriously
affected judicial independence;
Whereas the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) on November 7,
2012, issued Merits Report 76/12 regarding the Garifuna community of
Triunfo de la Cruz, and on May 21, 2013, issued Merits Report 30/13
regarding the Garifuna community of Punta Piedra, reports in which the
IACHR found that the rights of both communities and their members had
been violated, including the rights to property and judicial protection,
and that the government had failed to investigate and prosecute the
violence against the communities and their members;
Whereas the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corporation, whose holdings have
been transferred to the United States International Development Finance
Corporation, approved on March 17, 2014, the financing of the Jaremar
palm oil corporation, whose supply chain includes palm oil from
plantations in areas claimed by Garifuna communities, including Triunfo
de la Cruz;
Whereas, on October 8, 2015, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruled on
the complaints filed by the communities of Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta
Piedra that, despite the titles granted by the Government of Honduras to
the Garifuna communities of Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra, the
Government of Honduras had violated the rights of these communities,
including the right to consultation, the right to property, the
obligation of non-discrimination and the right to a fair trial and
judicial protection, and had failed to investigate acts of violence
against the community, including four violent deaths in the case of
Triunfo de la Cruz and one death in the case of Punta Piedra, ordering
the restitution of land rights to Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra
and the effective investigation of the murder of community members of
Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra;
Whereas Garifuna territory along the northern coast of Honduras is located
within one of the principal transit corridors for illegal narcotics
traveling through Honduras to meet consumer demand in the United States,
as described by the Department of State's Bureau of International
Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs in its 2015 International
Narcotics Control Strategy Report, which stated, ``Eighty to ninety
percent of cocaine that transits through Honduras arrives via maritime
shipment. In 2014, the U.S. government estimated that sixty percent of
cocaine smuggling flights that departed from South America first landed
in Honduras - a decline from 75 percent of such flights in 2013. The
Caribbean coastal region of Honduras remained the primary landing zone
for drug-carrying flights and illicit maritime traffic. The region is
vulnerable to narcotics trafficking due to its remoteness, limited
infrastructure, lack of government presence, and weak law enforcement
institutions.'';
Whereas the Government of Honduras and its judiciary have engaged in a pattern
of falsely accusing the Indigenous people of the North Coast of engaging
in drug trans-shipment as justification for violating their fundamental
rights, including the right to life and liberty, and the Honduran
military forces have engaged in a pattern of deadly use of force against
Garifuna and other Indigenous peoples of the Caribbean Coast with
similar justifications;
Whereas, on March 30, 2016, the brother of then-President of Honduras Juan
Orlando Hernandez and on May 16, 2016, the son of his predecessor
Porfirio Lobo Sosa, were convicted by Federal courts in the Southern
District of New York of drug trafficking-related charges stemming from
actions they carried out on the North Coast of Honduras, and in the
course of these and other trials, testimony was given implicating then-
Security Minister Julian Pacheco and then-President Hernandez in direct
involvement in drug trafficking;
Whereas in October 2016, in response to a complaint from OFRANEH, the Compliance
Advisor Ombudsman of the IFC initiated a compliance review of a tourism
complex developed with land and resources from the territory of the
Garifuna communities of Barra Vieja, Tornabe, San Juan Tela and Triunfo
de la Cruz, a project that attracted, and continued to seek, investment
from corporations in the United States;
Whereas, on November 5, 2019, in a statement to a local Honduran publication,
OFRANEH condemned the death of 16 Garifuna, including six women,
highlighting the murder of Mirna Suazo Martinez, president of the board
of the Garifuna Community of Masca, who was leading the defense of
Masca's rivers and territory in opposition to the construction of a
hydroelectric plant, and who had made public statements describing
several threats against her a few days before her murder;
Whereas, on July 18, 2020, four Garifuna men from Triunfo de la Cruz, including
the President of the Community Development Committee who had led the
community's recent efforts to stop the illegal appropriation of Garifuna
land and demand that the Honduran Government implement the 2015 Inter-
American Court ruling, were abducted at gunpoint by men wearing uniforms
bearing the logo of the DPI National Police unit and have not been
located since, an action that the Working Group on Enforced
Disappearances of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Human Rights qualified on July 20, 2020, as an enforced disappearance;
Whereas, on November 11, 2020, the families of the disappeared and the Garifuna
communities, outraged by the lack of investigation into the whereabouts
of the victims of the July 18, 2020, forced disappearances, created the
Comite Garifuna de Investigacion y Busqueda de los Desaparecidos de
Triunfo de la Cruz (SUNLA), an independent commission to investigate and
bring about the prosecution of the crime;
Whereas the United States military conducts training of Honduran military units
on the northern coast of Honduras, including at bases such as the 15th
Battalion and 4th Naval Base that have been implicated in serious human
rights abuses and corruption associated with organized criminal
activity;
Whereas the United States controls 15.72 percent of the Board of Directors of
the World Bank and 30 percent of the Board of Directors of the Inter-
American Development Bank (IDB), and uses its voice to exert a
significant degree of influence on the decisions of these institutions;
Whereas, on March 3, 2021, sisters Marianela and Jennifer Mejia Solorzano were
arrested along with 30 other Garifuna rights defenders who are facing
criminal proceedings arising from two sets of charges filed by the
Public Prosecutor's Office for allegedly committing the crimes of
damages, threats, theft and usurpation in their lands owned by the
Garifuna communities of Cristales and Rio Negro;
Whereas, on July 27, 2021, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner
for Human Rights in Honduras and the IACHR called on the Government of
Honduras ``to adopt measures to prevent the criminalization of Garifuna
human rights defenders, particularly those who defend land, territory,
and natural resources'' and to ``guarantee a hostility-free environment
for those defending human rights and to increase measures to respect and
protect the rights of the Garifuna people over their lands, territories,
and natural resources,'' citing the need to protect the communities from
potential violations alleged in petitions pending rulings from the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights;
Whereas, on November 28, 2021, Xiomara Castro was elected President of Honduras
in a historic election and sworn in as the first woman President of
Honduras on January 27, 2022, and as part of her platform she proposed
respect for the land rights, language and culture of Indigenous peoples,
including the promotion and restoration of land titles of Indigenous
communities and the promotion of public policies to stop invasions of
Indigenous lands; and
Whereas in a recent communique, OFRANEH stated that on August 9, 2022, the
organization was visited by the Public Prosecutor's Office and demanded
progress in the investigation of the July 18, 2020, forced
disappearances from Triunfo de la Cruz, but instead of reporting on the
investigation and prosecution of those responsible for the forced
disappearances, the Attorney General's office, in another episode of
persecution, harassment, and criminalization, instructed the
Prosecutor's Office Against Common Crimes and the Technical Agency for
Criminal Investigation (ATIC) to initiate criminal proceedings against
OFRANEH's General Coordinator Miriam Miranda, OFRANEH member Luther
Castillo, and OFRANEH lawyer Edy Tabora: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) condemns the violence against Garifuna communities that
is directed especially against land rights defenders and
Indigenous authorities;
(2) calls for the Comite Garifuna de Investigacion y
Busqueda de los Desaparecidos de Triunfo de la Cruz's (SUNLA)
full participation in the investigation into the whereabouts of
Sneider Centeno, Milton Joel Martinez, Suami Aparicio, and
Gerardo Trochez, and the prosecution of those responsible for
their disappearance;
(3) calls for the creation of an effective and independent
office for a Special Prosecutor for Enforced Disappearances in
Honduras;
(4) condemns the illegal separation of Garifuna communities
from their legitimate land rights;
(5) calls for the swift and full implementation of the
October 8, 2015, ruling of the Inter-American Court of Human
Rights that obliges the Government of Honduras to restore land
rights to the communities of Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta
Piedra, and to investigate the murder of five members of both
communities;
(6) strongly disapproves of the decisions of multilateral
development banks that finance projects that contribute to the
extinction of the legitimate land rights of Garifuna
communities and finance security forces involved in serious
human rights violations;
(7) is concerned that United States bilateral assistance to
Honduras may jeopardize or otherwise contribute to the
violation of the fundamental rights of Garifuna communities;
(8) urges the Government of Honduras to--
(A) fully and immediately comply with the 2015
judgment of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights
restoring land rights to the communities of Triunfo de
la Cruz and Punta Piedra and investigating the murders
of five members of both communities;
(B) grant SUNLA formal status in the investigation
of the forced disappearance of Sneider Centeno and
three other Garifuna men from Triunfo de la Cruz; and
(C) establish a Special Prosecutor for Enforced
Disappearances within the Prosecutor's Office;
(9) requests the institutions of the World Bank Group to--
(A) immediately suspend funding for any project
that may contribute to violence against Garifuna
communities or violations of their human rights and
consult with the affected communities on possible
corrective measures;
(B) identify measures that the institutions could
implement to promote compliance with the 2015 judgments
of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights ordering
Honduras to restore land rights to the communities of
Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra and to investigate
violence against those communities, acting on the
measures only after full consultation with and consent
of the legitimate authorities of the Garifuna
communities;
(C) undertake a comprehensive and independent
review of the projects that any such institution has
supported over the past 25 years that have an impact on
the land rights of Indigenous communities in Honduras,
and publish a report with their findings;
(D) carefully review their loan portfolios, and the
structure for on-the-ground implementation of those
projects, in order to identify funding that may benefit
agencies implicated in human rights violations and
violence directed against Indigenous communities in
Honduras; and
(E) demand that the executors of the projects
financed from any loan made by any such institution
comply with the process of free, prior, and informed
consultation with the communities, as established in
International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention 169;
(10) calls on the Inter-American Development Bank to--
(A) undertake a thorough, independent, and public
review of the projects it has supported over the past
15 years that directly or indirectly benefit security
agencies in Honduras and other projects that may
potentially be implicated in human rights violations;
(B) carefully review its loan portfolio, and the
structure for on-the-ground implementation of those
projects, in order to identify funding that may benefit
government agencies or other actors that contribute to
or benefit from the dispossession of Indigenous
communities in Honduras;
(C) increase the review of projects prior to
financing to identify projects that could result in the
violation of human rights agreements to which Honduras
is a signatory and refrain from financing the projects;
and
(D) ensure compliance with the provisions of ILO
Convention 169 regarding prior consultation before the
approval of projects that affect the communities, and
the completion of the respective environmental impact
studies for each project; and
(11) urges the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the
Treasury, and the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, in coordination with the heads of
other relevant Federal departments and agencies, to--
(A) engage at the highest level with the Government
of Honduras, and maintain close coordination with
international allies and multilateral organizations
with influence in Honduras, to promote compliance with
the resolutions of the Inter-American Court of Human
Rights, in particular the 2015 judgments to restore the
rights of the Garifuna communities of Triunfo de la
Cruz and Punta Piedra;
(B) alert United States-based companies and other
investors in Honduras to the risks and potential
liabilities associated with investing in lands whose
rights may have been illegitimately severed from
Indigenous communities; and
(C) use its vote and voice within multilateral
development banks to oppose any loans or technical
assistance projects that may threaten the rights of
Garifuna communities, and to advocate for reparations
for communities affected by multilateral development
bank financing that have contributed to human rights
violations, in accordance with international standards
for reparations.
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