Killing of Isidro Baldenegro Lopez
On 15 January 2017, Mexican human rights defender Isidro Baldenegro Lopez was shot in the home of a relative and died later from his injuries. According to local media reports the murder suspects are linked with known assassins of other indigenous environmental activists in the region.
Isidro Baldenegro Lopez was a farmer and community leader of Mexico’s indigenous Tarahumara people, in the Sierra Madre mountain region. He spent much of his life defending old growth forests from devastating logging in a region torn by violence, corruption and drug-trafficking. He was a recipient of the 2005 Goldman Prize.
On 15 January 2017, Mexican human rights defender Isidro Baldenegro Lopez was shot in the home of a relative and died later from his injuries. According to local media reports the murder suspects are linked with known assassins of other indigenous environmental activists in the region.
Isidro Baldenegro Lopez was a farmer and community leader of Mexico’s indigenous Tarahumara people, in the Sierra Madre mountain region. He spent much of his life defending old growth forests from devastating logging in a region torn by violence, corruption and drug-trafficking. He was a recipient of the 2005 Goldman Prize.
"Isidro Baldenegro Lopez is just the latest environmental defender to be killed because of their work defending the land and environmental rights of indigenous communities.
We condemn this latest killing and we call on the government of Mexico to take meaningful and immediate action to bring the perpetrators to justice", said Jim Loughran, Head of the HRD Memorial Project.
In December Front Line Defenders in partnership with a coalition of national and International organisations launched the HRD Memorial which will document all the cases of HRDs who have been killed since 1998, when the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders came into effect. The HRD Memorial will celebrate the life work and achievements of HRDs killed and will challenge the assumption by repressive governments that they can kill HRDs with impunity.
In its recently published Annual Report Front Line Defenders documented the killing of 281 human rights defenders worldwide in 2016 – 26 of them in Mexico. 49% of the HRDs killed in 2016 were working on land, environmental or indigenous rights issues.
