Honduras

In Honduras, one of the poorest countries of Latin America, violations of human rights are widespread. Since late 2017 presidential elections, that were manipulated, the country has been going through a political crisis. Street protests were suppressed at several occasions leading to detentions, beatings and even killings. The human rights landscape - especially when it comes to women rights and land rights - has been poor since the 2009 coup and possibly will worsen under the leadership of current authoritarian president who got re-elected.

Civil society support

People in Need started working in Honduras in 2016 when it received first request to help by a Honduran journalist. Subsequently, PIN decided to start working with civil society in Honduras, with emphasis on woman and environmental organizations and people that live in problematic or marginalized locations. Our main goal is to support human rights defenders and civil society organizations that aim to empower women and achieve greater gender equality and that protest against mining industry, which affects people!s health, farmers’ territories, environmental balance or forcibly moves out whole communities.

Until the end of 2017, we were able to establish working relationship with several non-governmental organizations in Honduras that thanks to our help were able to, for example, start professionalizing programming of their local radio station that –as the only one in the region- focuses on sensitive human rights topics, including land rights. This radio station has been running thanks to very limited financial support from rural population that listens to it. Yet, with our help, they were able to organize capacity building for volunteers that work at the radio, and thus improve streamed content and even define vision for future, which should allow them to grow and provide more programs.