“The Fenix Mining Project in Guatemala, of Swiss company Solway Investment Group, has operated illegally with the complicity of the governments of Presidents Jimmy Morales and Alejandro Giammattei”

María Choc es colega y amiga desde hace algo más de una década. Es una mujer Q’eqchi’ y defensora de derechos humanos e indígenas. Los Q'eqchi'es, una de las 23 naciones indígenas de Guatemala, viven en las tierras altas y bajas del norte del país.

Maria Choc is sister-in-law of Adolfo Ich, a land and rights defender killed in 2009 while denouncing mining related harms and violations. She is sister of Angelica Choc, widow of Adolfo Ich, now leading justice struggles in Guatemala and Canada for the death of her husband. And, Maria is the sister of Ramiro Choc, who spent 6 years in jail as a political prisoner – criminalized on malicious charges for his land and rights defense work.

El 23 de mayo 2022, falleció el defensor de la madre tierra y de territorio, Ramiro Choc, en El Estor, Izabal, a sus 54 años de edad.

“The call for a safe supply, coming from drug user activists in Canada, is a brave intervention that could have far-reaching consequences – first, in stopping deadly overdoses, but also in ending the harms of militarized prohibition in the South.” (Dawn Paley)

Maria Choc is sister-in-law of Adolfo Ich, a land and rights defender killed in 2009 while denouncing mining related harms and violations. She is sister of Angelica Choc, widow of Adolfo Ich, now leading justice struggles in Guatemala and Canada for the death of her husband. And, Maria is the sister of Ramiro Choc, who spent 6 years in jail as a political prisoner – criminalized on malicious charges for his land and rights defense work.

En 1981-1982, los regímenes genocidas guatemaltecos, respaldados por Estados Unidos, llevaron a cabo cinco masacres a gran escala contra el pueblo maya achí de la aldea de Río Negro, para dar paso a la presa hidroeléctrica de Chixoy del Banco Mundial y el Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo (BID), un proyecto de inversión en energía que fue financieramente rentable para ambos bancos de "desarrollo" y que dio lugar a una muerte masiva y a la devastación de Río Negro, y de docenas de pueblos mayas a lo largo del río Chixoy.

Five massacres were carried out by the Guatemalan regime to make way for World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank’s Chixoy hydro-electric dam project
By Grahame Russell, Rights Action

"Defending your territory is not a crime, rather it is defending the habitat of humanity"