On March 13th the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms. Navi Pillay, visited Guatemala, giving an audience to the grievances of the Indigenous peoples in the country during a visit to the highland town of Totonicapan.
Thousands of Indigenous peoples and campesinos in Guatemala have embarked on a nine-day protest march to the capital city, covering over 214 kilometers. Organized by the Comite de Unidad Campesino, (CUC) the march demands the attention of the State of Guatemala, as well as local, national, and international media to the issues facing the rural Indigenous and campesino majority of the country.
San Luis Jilotepeque is a town in the department of Jalapa, located on the southeast of Guatemala.
The constitutional court of Guatemala has failed to issue a decision on the constitutionality of the current Telecommunications Law, despite the established two-month limit for a decree.
On the last weekend in January 2012, Cultural Survival's partner network of pilot radio stations gathered together once again in San Mateo, Quetzaltenango to participate in a workshop about the Mayan calendar and spirituality. Cultural Survival invited representatives of twenty different radio community stations to learn about the meanings behind the K’iche Maya solar calendar from two Mayan spiritual guides from the town of Momostenango, Totonicpan, who addressed in detail what the 2012 change means for the Mayans.
Translated from Prensa Libre February 14th, 2012
By MARIELOS MONZÓN
In Momostenango, a small town in the highland region of Guatemala, the Quiche Mayan community did not enter the 2012 year dreading doomsday predictions. Instead, they’re gearing up for their biggest party yet.
Noe Navarro is from an Indigenous Maya Mam community in the north-western part of Guatemala, called San Miguel Ixtahuacan, San Marcos. He has been involved in social activism over the past ten years, helping to organize the community's struggle against the infamous Marlin gold mine, which has been operating in San Miguel since 2005, and has been environmentally as well as socially damaging for his community.
Last week the community radio movement won a partial victory in the fight for democratic access to radio frequencies in Guatemala, with the congress's failure to vote approval on the bill 4404, which would have extended the current radio frequencies allocated to the mass media for another 25 years.
By rejecting the bill in it's first round of debate, the bill will be delayed until it can be re-entered in the next calendar year when the newly-elected Congress takes office.
The community radio movement publicly denounced bill 4404, as it disregards Indigenous Peoples' right to access media and is celebrating this measured victory. "The news comes as such a relief," explained movement leader Alberto Recinos. "We feel that the actions we have taken to prevent bill 4404 from passing at this stage have really had an impact. The decision to delay further debate gives us time to strategize our next steps."
In a recent editorial in Guatemala's major newspaper La Prensa Libre, UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression and ally of the community radio movement, Dr. Frank La Rue, also expressed his disapproval of the legislation. His opinion piece, entitled "Behind the People's Backs" is summarized in English below. Read his full article in Spanish, here.
Reconocimiento de tierra
Reconocemos que nuestra sede está en la tierra de Massachusetts, en Cambridge, MA, y agradecemos a los administradores Indígenas pasados, actuales y futuros de este territorio.
