‘If the bullets don’t kill you, then hunger will,’ says Yoni Rivas starkly before going on to list fellow campesinos killed in a bitter, drawn-out conflict over land in Honduras. Among the dead he names the lawyer Antonio Trejo Cabrera, a prominent human rights defender.
‘Bajo Aguán is a very productive area, but today we don’t even produce what we need,’ Rivas says. ‘The land has been grabbed by big multinational companies.’ A leader from the United Campesino Movement of Aguán (MUCA), Rivas warns of a wave of persecution and criminalization of peasant farmers who dare to challenge powerful land barons.
