Death threats against Ligia Arreaga
On 24 May 2016, Ligia Arreaga was discussing the environmental destruction of Matusagaratí with a taxi driver when the latter allegedly warned her that 'the Colombians' would kill her if she continued campaigning for the protection of the wetland. The driver was referring to Colombian businessmen with commercial interests vested in palm oil and rice plantations in the wetland. It appears the driver had transported several of these businessmen to and from Darién in the past. Since 2007, Ligia Arreaga has denounced the illegal selling and buying of land in Matusagaratí's protected areas.
Ligia Arreaga is the Coordinator of the Alianza por un Mejor Darién (AMEDAR - Association for a Better Darien) and an investigative journalist at SERTV. AMEDAR is an organisation dedicated to the environmental conservation of the Matusagaratí Lagoon wetlands, a 50,000 hectares area in the province of Darien of which only 15,000 are protected. Matusagaratí is the largest wetland and fresh water reservoir in Panama, in addition to being the home to wide-ranging biodiversity. Ligia Arreaga has constantly denounced the unlawful privatisation and environmental destruction of the Matusagaratí wetland.
On 24 May 2016, Ligia Arreaga was discussing the environmental destruction of Matusagaratí with a taxi driver when the latter allegedly warned her that 'the Colombians' would kill her if she continued campaigning for the protection of the wetland. The driver was referring to Colombian businessmen with commercial interests vested in palm oil and rice plantations in the wetland. It appears the driver had transported several of these businessmen to and from Darién in the past. Since 2007, Ligia Arreaga has denounced the illegal selling and buying of land in Matusagaratí's protected areas.
Ligia Arreaga has been repeatedly harassed and intimidated in the past as a result of her environmental activism and her work as an investigative journalist exposing corruption. On 3 August 2015, Ligia Arreaga submitted a complaint to the police for threats against her life. In December 2009, the defender escaped an assassination attempt. One of the killers-for-hire who was after her warned a priest about the assassination plan. Arreaga denounced the attempt to the police in Palma, but when she returned in January 2010 to request a copy she was told her file was 'lost'.
On March 2016, an arson fire set off by unknown individuals ravaged 2,500 hectares of the wetland; AMEDAR has since relentlessly campaigned for the government of Panama to declare all of the Matusagaratí wetlands a protected area. Previously, AMEDAR had submitted over 15 complaints against private individuals for illegally acquiring land in the protected area, including against Colombian bussinessman José Javier Daza Pretelt. The latter was convicted in Colombian courts of forced displacement, invasion of environmentally protected areas and conspiring to commit a crime for actions perpetrated in the region of Chocó, Colombia, as a legal representative of the palm oil company Urapalma. AMEDAR has also denounced the private company Agricultura y Servicios Panamá S.A. for allegedly acquiring illegal land titles in the protected area of Matusagaratí for the cultivation of palm oil and rice, as a result the Ministry of the Environment has begun an administrative investigation into the company.
