n a Tuesday in March, indigenous activist Nelson García was shot in the face in northwest Honduras. The next day, in Guatemala, unknown attackers found environmentalist Walter Méndez outside his…
n the eve of the Olympic Games’ opening ceremony in Rio de Janeiro, indigenous leaders and human rights advocates spoke out today to highlight the rising violence against indigenous people…
n the oil-rich department of Casanare in eastern Colombia, Daniel Abril Fuentes was known as a campesino leader, defender of human rights, and constant critic of the oil interests he…
hree activists standing trial from Cambodian environmental NGO Mother Nature Cambodia were released from prison on Friday. They had been incarcerated ahead of trial in Koh Kong City prison since…
Bill Kayong, a dedicated land rights activist and member of the opposition party in Malaysia’s Sarawak state, was killed in a drive-by shooting while waiting at a traffic light in…
It's a dangerous time to take a stand for the environment. 2015 was the worst year on record for killings of people defending their forests, rivers, and lands from industrial…
Other stories in Mongabay’s series on the Maya Biosphere Reserve: Killing of Guatemalan activist in the Maya Biosphere Reserve raises alarm Communities lead the way in rainforest conservation in Guatemala…
The risk of murder is higher for environmental activists and wildlife officers than for police officers. Protecting the planet is a dangerous job. Schoolyard massacres and suicide bombers make the…
n November 2008, a gang of around 70 assailants attacked S. Mugilan and his nine comrades with kadaparais (crowbars) and aruvals (curved machetes). The attack took place at around three…
t age 70 Ngai Mutuoboro may not possess the vibrancy of his youthful days, but he can still pack a punch when it comes to environmental conservation. The elder from…
When we learned that Berta Cáceres, a leader of the indigenous Lenca people, was murdered in Honduras, we were shocked but not surprised. A violent death is the all-too-frequent fate…
A landmark decision by Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen could see almost a million hectares of forest reclassified as protected areas in a country with one of the highest deforestation…
Elephant poachers killed three wildlife rangers and wounded two more in a shootout yesterday in Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, reports African Parks, a conservation group…
sla Mayor is a village of about 6,000 in the Spanish province of Seville. It stands just a few miles away from Doñana National Park and Natural Reserve, one of…
ndigenous peoples in Brazil are at risk from an alarming uptick in violence as well as from natural-resource development projects that threaten their existence. That's what United Nations Special Rapporteur…
n May 30 2013, Jairo Mora Sandoval, a sea turtle conservationist, and four women volunteers were kidnapped by a group of men at gunpoint on Moin beach near Limón, Costa…
n January 22, 2005, a big headline filled the front page of Diário do Pará, the second biggest newspaper of the northern Brazilian state of Pará. “The journalist Lúcio Flávio…
Other stories in Mongabay’s series on the Maya Biosphere Reserve: Successes and many challenges in Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve Communities lead the way in rainforest conservation in Guatemala Controversial park…
ambodian authorities released a leader of the Chong indigenous group from prison on March 3. Ven Vorn, imprisoned since October, was convicted of harvesting forest products without authorization and sentenced…
Two weeks ago, the activist Berta Cáceres was shot and killed while she slept in her home, in the city of La Esperanza, in western Honduras.The news of her assassination travelled around the world…
The year is ending on a grim note in Peru: yet another environmental leader that vocally opposed a dam project has been murdered in his home in the town of Yagen, in…
Another prominent environmentalist has been killed in Peru. On Thursday night, Alfredo Ernesto Vracko Neuenschwander, a woodworker who led a movement to resist forest invasions by illegal gold miners in…
Cambodian authorities have detained four activists linked to the environmental group Mother Nature Cambodia. The four, all Cambodian nationals, await trial at a prison in the country's southwestern province of…
palm oil company remains at the heart of conflict in northern Guatemala, months after a mass fish die-off. A day after company operations were suspended pending further investigation into the…
It has become a political ritual: in February 2014, shortly after his election, Hery Rajaonarimampianina, Madagascar’s newest president, publicly denounced the “plague” of illegal logging and the pillage of the…
he streets of Ecuador will fill with colorful flags and footsteps again on Wednesday as indigenous organizations and other groups renew protests over government policies. The planned marches come on…
n 1997, the government of Botswana began evicting San and Bakgalagadi people from their homelands in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve out of concern that the groups' hunter-gatherer way of…
Indigenous small-scale miners and traditional authorities in western Colombia are facing threats in the wake of a local leader’s murder this spring. On April 7, 2015, Fernando Salazar Calvo was…
They came at dawn. Police officers in riot gear wielding assault rifles and flanked by attack dogs took aim at protesters in the camp. Their targets, the police had been…
Sea turtle nesting grounds on Pacuare Beach, Costa Rica, where poachers attacked conservationists late last month. Photo credit: Sea Shepherd/Eva Hidalgo. Activists working to protect sea turtles have once again…
