Life And Struggle Of Berta Cáceres On The 10th Anniversary Of Her Assassination

On the 10th anniversary of the assassination of Indigenous Lenca leader and environmental defender Berta Cáceres, let us remember to honor her life, courage, and commitment to defending land, water, and Indigenous Peoples’ rights.

On March 2, 2016, Cáceres was ambushed and killed in her home in La Esperanza, Honduras after years of leading resistance against the Agua Zarca hydroelectric dam, a project imposed without the consent of the Lenca people and threatening the sacred Gualcarque River. Her murder was part of a systematic violence against Indigenous Peoples communities defending their ancestral lands.

Nearly a decade later, a comprehensive report released in January 2026 by the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI), mandated by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, confirmed that Cáceres’ assassination was not an isolated act but the result of a coordinated criminal operation involving corporate actors, military-linked intermediaries, hired gunmen, and networks within the Honduran government. The report also revealed that funds from international development banks connected to the dam project were diverted to finance surveillance, repression, and the murder of Cáceres.

“The recent reports exposed what Indigenous movements and river defenders long denounced: governments are killing Indigenous Peoples because they dared to defend ancestral land and the river against corporate plunder,” said ILPS Commission 10 convener Atama Katama, an indigenous Dusun from Sabah. “Bertha Cáceres assassination was a fascist crime rooted in the violent alliance of capital, state power, and militarized security forces.”

“The murder was predictable and preventable beacuse authorities possessed real-time intelligence detailing plans to attack Cáceres but failed to take preventive measures. Why? Government and military priority is business and corporate “development” and not Indigenous Peoples lives and rights,” he added.

While several perpetrators and a company executive have been convicted, the investigation found that the highest levels of corporate responsibility particularly among owners and financial backers of the dam project remain largely unpunished, according to the released report.

“Ten years after Berta’s martyrdom along with the many other Indigenous Peoples murdered by the state, a hard core of impunity persists,” Atama Katama stated. “Partial justice is injustice. Those who financed, planned, and benefited from the crime including corporate elites and international bank and imperialist financial institutions must be fully punished.”

Cáceres’ struggle with the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) became a symbol of resistance against destructive “development” projects imposed on Indigenous Peoples territories.

The conditions that led to her killing remain widespread across Mesoamerica, Asia and Africa. Defenders of land and territory continue to face violence, criminalization, and assassination. Since 2016, thousands of attacks against environmental and territorial defenders in Mesoamerica have been documented, including numerous killings of women leaders.

“This March 8, we are celebrating Internal Working Women’s Day, it is most timely to honor Bertha Cáceres and all the Indigenous woman who chose to be up front confronting attacks on Indigenous lands and rights.”

“And on March 14, we will be commemorating the International Day of Action for Rivers historically called the International Day against Dams, for Rivers, Water, and Life. Let us remember Bertha Cáceres and the lives in every community that refuses to surrender its land, rivers, and forests to colonial and imperialist conquest of corporate exploitation,” Atama said.

Justice for Berta Cáceres!
Justice for the Indigenous Peoples fighting for ancestral lands and self-determination!

Reference:
Atama Katama, ILPS Commission 10

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