Aurelia Arzú is a human rights defender from the Garifuna community in Honduras and vice coordinator of the Fraternal Black Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH). OFRANEH work to safeguard the economic, social, and cultural rights of the unique Garifuna ethnic community.
January 18, 2018
January 12, 2018
On January 7, 2018, in the village of La Concepción in Guerrero in southern Mexico, extrajudicial executions, acts of torture, and arbitrary detentions were carried out against members of a community group (CECOP, Communities Opposing the Dam La Parota) and against community police (Regional Coordination of Community Authorities – Community Police, or CRAC-PC, a community self-defense initiative). The community groups are targeted for their opposition to a dam on the Papagayo River.
December 18, 2017
Washington, DC / New York / Stuttgart / Geneva
PBI is observing with deep concern the situacion in Honduras in the days following the general elections that took place on November 26th, 2017. We hereby make an urgent call to the international community to call on the Honduran government to comply with their obligation to guarantee the protection, promotion, and respect of human rights and fundamental liberties.
The following is from an interview conducted in 2017 with Olga Silva by PBI UK.
Wangui Kimari works as the participatory action research coordinator for the Mathare Social Justice Center in Nairobi, Kenya, a community-based organization in the poor urban settlement Mathare. The organization strives for social justice by means of community engagement and the use of social movement platforms. The following is from an interview with Kimari conduced by PBI.
Police violence in the slums of Kenya: “I learned that he had been shot down by a police officer” is a short documentary with Kenyan human rights defender Stephen Mwangi from Mathare Social Justice Centre (MSJC).
I was born in Kibera and I grew up in Kibera; growing up here was both a privilege and a struggle. Life is difficult in Kibera and we live in poverty here, but this place makes a woman strong and I believe that I am strong today because I grew up in Kibera.
I come from a family of four daughters. My father was never really in the picture, but I never felt the absence of a father-figure in the house; Mama has been such a role model in that sense. She would say “whatever you want to do, you can do it.” Whenever we would complain about not having a brother to help us fix household things, she would push us to learn how to do it ourselves.