• Protecting Water and Farmland in Simcoe County

Sunday April 8: Free Honduras political prisoners – meeting in Elmvale

By
In Council Watch
Mar 28th, 2018
0 Comments
5170 Views
Edwin Espinal in Rio Blanco

Edwin Espinal, in November 2015 with young friends in Rio Blanco where he had gone to support Berta Cáceres, just months before her assassination. -Karen Spring photo

From Simcoe County Honduras Rights Monitor 

The Spring family of Elmvale is hosting a meeting on the extreme danger faced by their daughter Karen, a human rights worker in Honduras, and the inhumane treatment of Karen’s spouse Edwin Espinal, jailed for almost three months on trumped-up charges.

When: Sunday April 8, 2018
Where: Elmvale Community Hall, 33 Queen Street West

Download and print flier for meeting

Speakers
Jeff Monague is a member of the Beausoleil First Nation on Christian Island and currently resides in Coldwater Ont. Presently, he is the Manager at Springwater Provincial Park. He has been an instructor of the Ojibwe Language and has taught at every level, from junior kindergarten to post-secondary at Georgian College.He is a former Chief and Councillor of his community on Christian Island and has been the Treaty Research Coordinator for the Anishinaabek Nation. He is also a Canadian Military Veteran.
Dr. Tyler Shipley, PhD, York University, International Studies, Humber College, School of Liberal Arts & Sciences , scholar and author specializing in Honduran issues. His recent book is called “book “Ottawa and Empire: Canada and the Military Coup in Honduras”
–Karen Spring,  the Honduras-based Coordinator for the Honduras Solidarity Network (HSN), a network of over 30 orgs from Canada and the US. She has lived and worked in Honduras for nine years supporting Honduran human rights organizations, indigenous groups and social movements in the country. Karen works extensively with the families of the political prisoners and human rights groups demanding their release.
Representatives speaking from the Government of Canada – our local MPs – Bruce Stanton, and Alex Nuttall, and Springwater Township Mayor Bill French, and Deputy Mayor Don Allen.

Canada’s direct role

With direct US and Canadian involvement in economic interests in the country, and their continued fiscal and military support of this corrupt regime, the Honduran people have been increasingly vulnerable to repression, murder, disappearances, and terrorization as the Honduran government of Hernandez operates freely on the ‘good will’ of our governments. Without Canadian and US support, the Hernandez government would ‘fall;’ repression and violence against the millions of pro-democracy supporters like Edwin Espinal would end.

The Spring family is demanding that the Canadian government intervene in Edwin’s case and force the Hernandez government to release him and the 30+ prisoners that are held in the inhumane military prisons throughout Honduras. The military prisons lack proper water facilities, washroom visits are restricted, small cells house nine men, lack of beds, food is very scarce, medical attention is often denied as is Edwin’s case now, contact with family members, human rights organizations, and legal representatives is minimal or forbidden.

These human rights violations, and degradation of human dignity must be stopped. Janet, her family, friends, and communities in Simcoe County and beyond will not stop their demands until Edwin is free.

BACKGROUND
Who is Karen Spring?
Karen Spring was born in 1984 and raised on her family’s dairy farm in Elmvale, Ontario. She is the second of five children of Janet Spring, music educator, and John Spring, dairy, chicken, and cash crop farmer. She attended elementary and secondary school in the village of Elmvale.

She studied human biology and world issues at the University of Toronto, graduating in 2008 and moving to Guatamala on a scholarship to research the health effects of Canadian mining practices in that country. In 2009, she began work in Honduras for Toronto-based Rights Action, and later as coordinator of the Honduran Solidarity Network.

Today her base is Tegucigalpa, the capital city of Honduras. She works with human rights organizations that investigate health abuses related to Canadian and US mining practices, monitor and advocate for better working conditions of women employed in the Canadian and US sweatshop industries of Gildan, Fruit of the Loom, and Jockey. They investigate the illegal detention of and eviction of campesinos (farmers) and indigenous Garifuna peoples from their lands in the Northern part of Honduras and provide them with legal, emotional, financial, and housing support.

In this Caribbean coastal area, the Canadian tourism companies of NJOI, Life Visions, and Caravida Villas are developing land that has been labelled as ‘Little Canada,’ where indigenous peoples have been evicted, murdered, imprisoned, and disappeared for protesting their evictions from the deeded lands their families have owned and lived on for centuries. Karen has been invited to speak on these issues to the House Committee on Human Rights in 2013 and 2014 in Ottawa. She has presented her work to many university groups and human rights organizations throughout North America.

In 2009, Karen met Edwin Espinal, a pro-democracy, human rights worker. They have been together since then. On January 19, 2018, Edwin was arrested by armed, masked military police as he was returning home from a pro-democracy rally.

On March 1, Edwin became ill. Karen was denied visitation three times. She has since been allowed limited access and is now not only fighting for his release, but for immediate medical attention. She has been in contact with James Hill – Ambassador to Honduras and Minister Chrystia Freeland’s office, yet with little progress. She is thankful for the support that she and Edwin are receiving from the community of Elmvale, Springwater Township, and local MPs Bruce Stanton and Alex Nuttall. She also thanks the many human rights and faith-based organizations that are working to free Edwin and other political prisoners.

Who is Edwin Espinal?
Edwin Espinal, age 42, is a long-time human rights worker and activist who lives in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. In 1999, he went to the United States for work to help support his siblings after Hurricane Mitch devastated the country. His brother’s death in 2008 prompted Edwin to leave the US to return home and care for his family. During this time, stability was returning to Honduras following the election of president Manuel Zelaya in 2006. In 2009, Zelaya was ousted by a US-backed coup d’état, creating a serious political and human rights crisis. Juan Orlando Hernandez came to power in 2013.

Edwin met Karen in late 2009. The two have worked together since then, through organizations affiliated with the Honduran Solidarity Network. Edwin has worked extensively with COFADEH, an indigenous organization formed by Berta Caceres who was murdered in 2016, Edwin assisted the Lenca peoples and Berta their leader, in the Rio Blanco district as they worked to stop the building of a dam on the Gualcarque River.

Edwin has been a target of the military regime of Honduras since 2009. He is highly regarded by his human rights peers and always ready to stand up for what is just for the people. He has never lost hope for change in Honduras. Yet the military regime continues to harass him. Since 2009, Edwin has been detained more than a dozen times, and has been beaten and tortured by security forces.

On January 19, 2018, Edwin was returning home from a pro-democracy rally when he was seized by masked military police and arrested on a laundry list of false charges. Since then he and 30+ political prisoners have been held in La Tolva Military Prison, south of Tegucigalpa, without due legal process. They are being held in horrific conditions that are hazardous to their health. Edwin is now very ill.

Leave a Reply

Commenters must post under real names. AWARE Simcoe reserves the right to edit or not publish comments. Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *