Urgent Action Needed: RAMIRO CHOC IS FREE – But Genocide is Advancing in the Battle for Guatemala
Ramiro Choc Exits Prison and Finds Genocide Advancing in the Battle for Guatemala
“Thank you to all who helped fight for my freedom… since I left prison, I have not stopped working” -Q’eqchi’ Peasant Leader and Organizer Ramiro Choc
October 2013 Guatemala Solidarity Project Update
www.guatemalasolidarityproject.org
After more than five years in various prisons, Ramiro Choc is finally free. Choc was born in extreme poverty in in northeastern Guatemala. His parents had been born slaves. At age 17 he became a catechist for the Catholic Church and earned a reputation as an eloquent, courageous promoter of liberation ideology. This ideology brought him great support among the peasant population but not among all of the church hierarchy.
After nearly thirteen years as a catechist, the gap between Choc’s liberation theology and the conservative doctrine of many of his superiors became too large. Choc was then hired by the National Indigenous and Peasant Coordinating Committee (CONIC) as an organizer, working primarily with indigenous communities involved in land struggles.
With CONIC, Choc played a lead role in a series of major land concessions favoring the ancestral rights indigenous communities. While many organizers view “success” as negotiations with the government leading to the recognition of a small portion of an indigenous community’s legitimate landholdings, Choc repeatedly helped organize communities to win recognition of all or nearly all their land. After approximately seven years, he left CONIC and helped form a new organization, Encuentro Campesino (Peasant Encounter/Gathering).
Through Encuentro Campesino Choc continued to have success in organizing indigenous Q’eqchi’ communities in support of their rights. But he rose to greater prominence by also working with ladino (of Spanish descent) and Garifuna (of African descent) peasants. His ability to unite diverse marginalized communities in defense of their rights grew to threaten the dominance of the government and wealthy landowners who looked for an opportunity to silence him.
Choc survived a series of assassination attempts, being shot at numerous times and occasionally injured. On February 14, 2008, Choc was kidnapped by members of the military who had orders to kill him. When the kidnapping and names of the soldiers quickly became public, they were forced to change their plans. He was held for five days in a secluded location before fraudulent charges were manufactured against him. He was marched through the streets chained from wrists to ankles and the national press slandered him as a wealthy drug dealer. The lies were unsuccessful, and thousands of peasants rose up to demand his release. The government responded with extreme violence, torturing and murdering protest organizers.
There was great doubt as to whether Choc would ever leave prison. The government routinely added ridiculous, fraudulent charges against him. He was charged with cutting down protected trees, despite his status as a great environmentalist who courageously exposed the deforestation of government officials and international interests. He was charged with kidnapping in a case which the government itself called on him to travel from hours away to support a hostage negotiation which had just developed. While in prison Choc survived beatings, assassination attempts, poisoning, withholding of medicine, strange medical procedures, and separation from his family and loved ones. What he says was the hardest was being in jail while the government and its wealthy allies massacred and tortured many of his closest friends and allies.
Encuentro Campesino, the organization he helped found, was driven underground, its key leaders murdered or forced into hiding with arrest warrants for “terrorism.” Choc’s close friend, the great indigenous peasant organizer Mario Caal Bolom, was tortured to death by police. His brother in law, teacher and indigenous leader Adolfo Ich Chaman, was murdered and mutilated by private security on behalf of a foreign mining corporation. Many of the communities Choc worked with were attacked, in some cases completely burned down.
Hunger and starvation are now more widespread in Guatemala than when Choc entered prison in 2008. A recent evaluation in one of our partner communities found that over 75% of children suffer from severe chronic malnutrition. US Army School of the Americas Graduate and genocidal General Otto Perez Molina is now President. Under Perez Molina, an unprecedented number of mining licenses have been authorized. Indigenous communities and highly bio-diverse forests have been destroyed in order to create access to mining or to convert their lands to monoculture for the purpose of export agriculture. Gold mining requires the use of cyanide and other dangerous chemicals, and extreme amounts of water. Monoculture agricultural production is more susceptible to disease and pests, leading to greater use of harmful pesticides and other chemicals.
This is the increasingly poisonous and dangerous Guatemala that Ramiro Choc finds himself released into. His courage and vision will help reverse this acceleration into oblivion, but he can’t do it alone. He will be joined by countless women and men indigenous and peasant leaders throughout the country. We stand in solidarity with them, and we ask you to join us. The easiest way to do so is through a contribution to the GSP. We are a volunteer run organization, so none of these funds will be used for administration fees, mailings, printing of materials, etc. All contributions will go to our partners in Guatemala who lead us in determining the use of funds.
The best way to contribute is to make a check out to “UPAVIM Community Development Foundation” and send to UPAVIM, PO Box 63, Marshfield, VT 05658. Please write “GSP” in the notes/memo section of the check. Or click here to donate online. We thank our fiscal sponsor UPAVIM for helping us ensure that your contributions are tax deductible and that all funds (other than bank transaction fees) go to our partners in Guatemala.
Previous videos and alerts about Ramiro Choc:
Ramiro Choc Remains in Prison as Indigenous Communities face Government Attacks and Increased Hunger
“We express ourselves through loving nature, loving life, loving humans, loving the past, loving the present, loving the future… I, like other comrades who suffer judicial persecution, try to defend humanity. In its entirety, not just the indigenous or garifuna but all human beings. This is our ultimate goal.” – Ramiro Choc
Guatemala Solidarity Project, February 14, 2013
To donate write a check to UPAVIM Community Development Foundation (you must write GSP in the notes/memo section of check) and send to UPAVIM, PO Box 63, Marshfield, VT 05658. Or click here to donate online
To sign the petition to free Ramiro Choc visit http://www.change.org/petitions/free-indigenous-leader-and-political-prisoner-ramiro-choc
The Guatemala Solidarity Project makes an urgent call for solidarity on the fifth anniversary of the illegal “arrest” of peasant leader Ramiro Choc. While Choc remains in prison for his courageous and eloquent stand against repression and environmental destruction, indigenous and peasant communities face continued attacks and increasing hunger.
Choc was pulled off a bus on February 14, 2008 by soldiers who had orders to kill him. After his detention quickly became public, the assassination plan was cancelled and Choc was eventually moved to prison and convicted on trumped up charges and without sufficient evidence. Even with the conviction, Choc has been eligible for release since February 14, 2011. The government has refused to process his release.
While Choc has been in prison, thousands of indigenous Guatemalans have been violently evicted from their ancestral lands. Peasant leaders continue to be targeted for imprisonment or assassination. International press has applauded a recent court ruling in Guatemala allowing genocide charges against former dictator Efrain Rios Montt to move forward. The charges are a good step and the result of the long, brave organizing of genocide survivors as well as pressure from international allies. The genocide trial may also allow current President General Otto Perez Molina to distract the international community with claims of progress while he violently supports the continued pillaging of indigenous lands.
Perez Molina himself should have been imprisoned long ago for his military leadership role in the 1980s in the Ixil triangle, one of the areas where the “scorched earth policy” was most viciously executed. Instead of sitting in a jail cell, Perez Molina is working to strengthen relationships with the US military. He is sending soldiers to his alma mater the US Army School of the Americas, and allowing the FBI, DEA, Marines and other US Armed Forces to lead operations in Guatemala.
Under Perez Molina, an unprecedented number of mining licenses have been authorized. Indigenous communities and highly bio-diverse forests have been destroyed in order to convert their lands to monoculture for the purpose of export agriculture. As a result hunger has been on the rise in Guatemala. Even the government’s own statistics, which we believe are rigged to lower the number, admit that more children died with severe malnutrition in 2012 than in the previous year. A recent evaluation in one of our partner communities found that 75% of children suffered from severe malnutrition.
Environmental destruction has also been rampant. Gold mining requires the use of cyanide and other dangerous chemicals, and extreme amounts of water. Monoculture agricultural production is more susceptible to disease and pests, leading to greater use of harmful pesticides and other chemicals.
Communities and leaders who organize for their rights are violently targeted. In October the Guatemalan military massacred 8 peasants and wounded dozens more at a nonviolent protest in Solola. In November over 2,000 police and soldiers participated in an attack against a GSP partner community. Our friend and peasant leader Manuel Bol was recently sentenced to five years in prison for organizing in support of his community’s ancestral rights to the land stolen from them by a biofuel company. Two weeks ago Daniel Pascual, coordinator of GSP partner organization the Committee of Peasant Unity, and two international accompaniers were confronted and threatened with death by men with machetes.
The examples of repression are nearly endless. As the US government and elites continue to build their economic and military support of the pillaging of Guatemala, it is increasingly important that allies stand in solidarity with indigenous and peasant communities in Guatemala. The GSP is requesting donations of any size to our fiscal partner the UPAVIM Community Development Foundation, a US 501c3. All funds will go directly to support our partners in Guatemala as we are a volunteer run organization. Donations are tax deductible and can be made via paypal or by sending a check. To donate write a check to UPAVIM Community Development Foundation and mail to UPAVIM, PO Box 63, Marshfield, VT 05658. Please write “GSP” in the notes section. Or click here to donate online
We are also looking for help in publicizing the petition to free Ramiro Choc Once you have signed the petition, please consider sharing it with friends, activist list serves, and other relevant places. The petition can be found at http://www.change.org/petitions/free-indigenous-leader-and-political-prisoner-ramiro-choc
Who is Ramiro Choc?
Ramiro Choc is a Q’eqchi’ peasant leader from northeastern Guatemala. With courage, dynamic organizing skills and commitment to social and environmental justice he has been a leader in numerous successful grassroots struggles.
Choc was born in extreme poverty in a plantation within the municipality of El Estor, Izabal. His parents had been born slaves. At age 17 he became a catechist for the Catholic Church, teaching a liberation theology that people should not only have justice after death in heaven but also during life on earth. This ideology brought him great support among the peasant population but not among all of the church hierarchy.
After nearly thirteen years as a catechist, the gap between Choc’s liberation theology and the conservative doctrine of many of his superiors became too large. Choc was then hired by the National Indigenous and Peasant Coordinating Committee (CONIC) as an organizer, working primarily with indigenous communities involved in land struggles.
With CONIC, Choc earned a reputation for his firm defense of the rights of indigenous communities. After approximately seven years, he left CONIC and helped form a new organization, Encuentro Campesino (Peasant Encounter/Gathering).
Through Encuentro Campesino Choc continued to have success in organizing indigenous Q’eqchi’ communities in support of their rights. He worked not only with Q’eqchi’ communities but also with ladino (of Spanish descent) and Garifuna (of African descent) peasants. His ability to unite diverse marginalized communities in defense of their rights grew to threaten the dominance of the government and wealthy landowners who looked for an opportunity to silence him.
After surviving numerous assassination attempts, on February 14, 2008, Choc was kidnapped by members of the military. He was taken to a secluded location for five days, and then sentenced to six years in prison in a farcical trial.
In August, 2011, Choc was transferred to Guatemala’s notorious Pavon Prison. Pavon is infamous for the many assassinations and massacres of prisoners which have occurred there. Part of our interview with Choc after the transfer can be viewed here Choc has needed to use extreme caution and planning to stay alive at Pavon.
Choc has been eligible for release since February 2011, but more than eight times the Guatemalan courts have refused to even consider legal motions calling for his release. Since Choc was arrested the government has accelerated its pillaging of indigenous lands, in some cases burning hundreds of homes and destroying thousands of acres of subsistence crops. Choc’s dynamic arguments in favor of indigenous rights, his ability to unite marginalized populations, and his courageous commitment to continue organizing in the face of repeated threats made him an enemy of wealthy corrupt landowners. In the 1990s and in the first decade of the 21s century, Choc escaped numerous assassination attempts, sometimes being left with bullet wounds on his neck and other parts of his body. But he refused to be silent and continued to risk his life by working with indigenous and peasant communities to reclaim their rights and denounce Government violence. Now it is our turn to refuse to be silent, and to raise our voices together with thousands of Guatemalan peasants to demand: Freedom for Ramiro Choc!
The Case Against Ramiro Choc
Ramiro Choc was convicted of occupying and stealing land, aggravated robbery, and illegal detention. The government lacked the evidence to prove their case in court, and the charges are clearly based on Choc’s political activism.
The government claims that in late 2007, in the community of Barrio Buena Vista la Esperanza, Choc detained a group of police and stole their weapons. But the government’s own evidence corroborates the fact that Choc wasn’t in the area when the confrontation took place. That morning, armed men attacked the community of Bella Vista, shooting at unarmed villagers, both men and children. The armed aggressors were employed by Ileana Lemus Solórzano de Castellán, a wealthy woman with strong government ties. Castellán ordered the attack in an attempt to steal land from the community.
The community was able to detain the attackers, and the government unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate their release. Eventually the Governor contacted Choc, a well known mediator, and requested that he come to help resolve the situation as a negotiator. Hours later Choc arrived, and he successfully negotiated a nonviolent end to the crisis. He signed the final agreement between representatives of the community and the government, which the prosecution uses as proof that it was he who detained the men. But the same agreement was signed by the mayor, governor, representatives of neighboring communities and representatives of numerous government institutions. Instead of being thanked for mediating a nonviolent solution to a violent conflict – he was arrested and is sleeping on a cement floor in prison.
As mentioned above, in 2008, months after the attack on Bella Vista, Choc was dragged off a public bus by soldiers who told him they would kill him. They took him to a secluded location, and only after news of his kidnapping had reached the outside did they say they had decided not to execute him. After five days, Choc was taken to court. Since being imprisoned, Choc has suffered beatings, poisoned food, and then months in isolation.
As national and international pressure continued to build against the government, Choc was transferred out of isolation and into Sector 12 of Guatemala City’s Zone 18 Jail. Then in late 2011, Choc was transferred to Guatemala’s notorious Pavon Prison. Pavon is famous in Guatemala as the home of assassinations and massacres of prisoners. On numerous occasions, prisoners in cases connected to government corruption have been transferred to the prison and executed while there. Shortly after Choc’s transfer, the director of the Pavon Prison told Choc’s lawyer and an international solidarity activist that it would be easy to order Choc’s murder.
Ramiro Choc’s Imprisonment and Repression against Peasant and Indigenous Communities
Choc was sentenced to 6 years, which under Guatemalan law meant that he was eligible for conditional release for good behavior after three years. However, the government has refused to follow the law and allow his release.
February 14, 2011 marked the first day that Choc became eligible for release. Indigenous leaders and solidarity activists planned to hold nonviolent actions on that day to demand Ramiro’s freedom. But on February 12, three Encuentro Campesino leaders, close friends of Ramiro who had recently visited him, disappeared. Their bodies were found on February 14, floating in a large body of water near the Caribbean Coast. They had been shot dozens of times.
Choc’s imprisonment and the February 12 massacre of his friends and fellow indigenous leaders are part of the systematic repression of indigenous and peasant communities in Guatemala. Choc has courageously stood up to this repression and continues to speak out while in prison despite the great threat. Many other indigenous leaders who have visited Ramiro have been assassinated, in addition to the three young leaders who were killed earlier this year.
For example, on March 15, 2008, Choc’s close friend and well respected peasant leader Mario Caal Bolom was murdered. The government’s own human rights ombudsman’s office concluded that he had been tortured and murdered by the police. On September 27, 2009, Choc’s brother-in-law Adolfo Ich Xaman, another committed indigenous leader, was brutally murdered and mutilated by the private security of a multinational corporation.
The assassinations of Choc’s friends, like his imprisonment, are part of the government’s criminalization of indigenous and peasant human rights defenders. This repression seeks to silence indigenous and peasant communities so that the government can continue its almost daily violent “evictions” of indigenous and peasant communities. These attacks are carried out by soldiers, police, private security and paramilitaries. The purpose is to remove communities from their ancestral lands so that private individuals and corporations can profit from Guatemala’s rich natural resources.
These “evictions” usually include the burning of peasant homes and crops. Most indigenous communities in Guatemala rely on subsistence agriculture to survive. The evictions leave families facing hunger and a desperate struggle for survival. For example, in March, 2011 in Panzos, in northeast Guatemala, government and private security forces “evicted” 15 communities and destroyed over 1,000 acres of corn and other basic grains.
The corn was nearing harvest, and the indigenous communities that had planted and worked the fields were anxiously waiting the food it would provide. They were poor, but they were not starving. After the evictions, hundreds of families were left homeless and without food. Numerous community leaders were shot, imprisoned and/or murdered. Several people from the communities have since starved to death, and thousands are suffering the effects of chronic malnutrition, such as stunted development, low energy and high susceptibility to illness. The land that they and their ancestors lived on is now being used to grow sugarcane and African palm for the production of biofuels.
In many parts of Guatemala, communities that were not rich but were at least void of starvation are now in a hunger crisis. This is in large part the result of the Central American Free Trade Agreement, the US Army School of the Americas, and other types of US-supported “economic development” and “security cooperation” which have been on the rise since the signing of the Peace Accords.
Ramiro Choc is a courageous leader whose only “crime” is eloquently speaking out against this violent pillaging of indigenous lands. We call for his immediate release, and for the end of government repression of indigenous and peasant communities.