GreenLatinos in the Amazon: COP30
Topacio Reynoso Pacheco, Sandra Liliana Peña Chocué, Paulo Paulino Guajajara’s, Homero Gómez González, Ari Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau’s
Nearly 200 names appear in memoriam at the start of the Global Witness report, Roots of Resistance. The report documents the struggles of land and water defenders around the world and exposes a tragic truth: in 2024 alone, 146 people were killed or disappeared while fighting for a safer, healthier, and more sustainable planet. The four countries with the highest rates of murders and disappearances are Colombia, Guatemala, México, and Brazil where COP30–the United Nations’ climate change conference–now takes place.
While climate activists, government delegations, and lobbyists gather in Belém, Brazil, one truth stands out. Justice is at stake for the 2,253 known land and water defenders who have been killed or disappeared since 2012, for their families, and for all of us fighting for cultural, economic, political, and environmental freedom. Even as the current presidential administration turns its back on global climate commitments, the GreenLatinos community continues the fight for climate, conservation, and environmental justice at home.
The Ongoing Crisis of Violence
The epidemic of violence against land and water protectors is rooted in the colonial history of community displacement across the Americas, driven by European powers seeking to expand their empires and exploit the people, wildlife, minerals, food, water, and sources of energy for their own gain. As a result, Indigenous people, Tribal Nations, women, LGBTQIA+ people, and rural communities are most at risk of threats when standing up for nature and human rights.
Murals at the Parque Zoobotânico do Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi in Belém, Brazil.
When Policy Fails, Violence Grows
Violence persists today because national and international policy is failing to recognize the land rights of rural communities and Indigenous peoples to live safely on their homelands.
For example, in 100 countries globally, women are still denied inheritance of their husbands’ property. Further, many governments look the other way when organized criminal groups attack communities, or reinforce policies that favor land dispossession and criminalize land and water activism so private corporations can expand industrial agriculture, mining, drilling, logging, and construction.
COP30 Main Entrance, Belém, Brazil
Global Commitments to Protect Nature
Each of the nations with the highest rates of violence against land and water protectors are signatories of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which among other goals, commits 196 countries to restore and conserve at least 30% of land, water and sea by 2030.
International Agreements That Require Defender Protection
El Escazú Agreement, el Aarhus Convention, y the Advisory Opinion of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights make it clear that nation-states must take proactive steps to ensure the safety of land and water protectors. A rapid response mechanism, action plan, y guidelines have been developed for this purpose.
Why These Protections Matter at COP30
As nations pursue meeting their biodiversity and conservation targets, they must further their commitment to protect environmental defenders and focus on those who are most vulnerable to violence at COP30. This discussion should inform crucial decisions expected to result from the Conference related to climate action financing, just transition, and adaptation planning.
Violence at Home in the United States
Land and water protectors in the United States and territories have also been the targets of violence and criminalization. In January 2023, Manuel (Manny) “Tortuguita” Terán was murdered by a Georgia State Patrol officer while defending the Weelaunee (South River) Forest in Atlanta, GA. This marked the first recent case of an environmental defender killed by law enforcement in the U.S. while acting for conservation justice. Their death is contextualized by unprecedented “domestic terrorism” charges levied against 13 Weelaunee Forest defenders. The fact that Tortuguita was a queer, non-binary, and Indigenous Venezuelan of Timoto-Cuica descent marks this injustice as an act of violence, making the United States also subject to the international tools that can create safer conditions for land and water protectors, and is indicative of the heightened rates of violence against LGBTQIA+ individuals.
Manuel (Manny) “Tortuguita”
Each year in observance of el Día de Los Muertos, GreenLatinos creates digital and physical ofrendas in memory of disappeared land and water protectors. We honor their sacrifices for a healthier planet during a culturally sacred time, amplifying the need for international accountability and justice. The Marco Latino de Justicia Climática calls on the United States to lead on ambitious policy at COP, including outcomes that will protect environmental defenders. Though our national delegation is markedly absent, GreenLatinos, our partners and allies across the country are at COP30 to advance the cause.
Global people's march during COP30, Belém, Brazil
What COP30 Must Deliver
At COP30, agreements must further protections for Indigenous, Afro-latine, women, rural, poor, and LGBTQIA+ environmental protectors. This should include methods of accountability for nation-states that directly participate in the violence or otherwise enable it through attempts to undermine democratic processes, criminalize activists, support extractive industries, or give impunity to criminal groups.
The United States Congress, regardless of its participation at COP and other international gatherings, has the power to secure justice. This can occur in the context of bi-national legal frameworks like the U.S.–México Bicentennial Framework for Security, Public Health, and Safe Communities, U.S. foreign assistance, sanctions, and more. Positive and impactful action opportunities are extensive. For instance, Congress could introduce a bill to establish an Office and Ambassador at Large for Environmental Defender Freedom; create pathways for threatened environmental defenders to gain asylum in the U.S.; update or create legal bi-national safety frameworks with Colombia, Guatemala, México, and Brazil; fund USAID to execute projects that strengthen foreign nations’ ability to prosecute cases against human rights violators; or establish federal environmental defender protection mechanisms.
AUTHOR: Olivia E. Juarez is the GreenLatinos Public Land Program Director. The GreenLatinos Public Land Program strives for our environmental liberation through the stewardship of accessible, inclusive, and healthy public lands.
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This blog post was a collaboration between our Justicia climática y aire limpio y Public Land and Ocean programs.
