Photo shows a Garífuna community encampment outside the Supreme Court of Justice of Honduras. Photo: Resumen Latinoamericano/file photo.
By Federico Pita – Aug 27, 2026
Land Grabbing, Criminalization, and Racism
In Honduras, various Garifuna organizations have condemned a policy of land seizures, criminalization, and racism targeting their communities in Honduras. At the Supreme Court, they have set up a camp to demand the release of five human rights defenders and compliance with the Inter-American Court’s rulings recognizing their rights to their ancestral territories.
For weeks now, members of various Garifuna communities have been gathered in front of the Supreme Court of Justice of Honduras. Organized by the Honduran Black Fraternal Organization (OFRANEH), led by Miriam Miranda, they have set up an indefinite encampment there to demand the dismissal of the case against five defenders from the community of San Juan, in Tela, and to call on the state to comply with international rulings recognizing their territorial rights. The protest also highlights a campaign of racism and criminalization that, according to Garifuna organizations, seeks to legitimize the dispossession of their ancestral territories.
The conflict has recently reached a turning point. On July 6, more than 200 National Police officers entered San Juan to carry out an eviction. Five community members were arrested and subsequently prosecuted by the Honduran justice system. The community maintains that the eviction was unlawful and that the police intervention contravened the territorial rights that had already been recognized by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
A month later, members of OFRANEH arrived in Tegucigalpa, the capital city, and set up the Campamento Viva Berta in front of the Supreme Court building. Members of various Garifuna communities remain there, including children, youth, and community leaders. They are demanding that the legal proceedings against the five defenders be dropped and that the judiciary stop treating a territorial conflict as a criminal matter.
The dispute over the lands of San Juan did not begin this year. The community claims the territory as part of its ancestral lands and maintains that there is a history of possession and records supporting that claim. The conflict reached the Inter-American Court, which in 2023 found the Honduran state responsible for violating various rights of the Garifuna community of San Juan. This is not the only such precedent. The Inter-American Court had already ruled against Honduras in the cases involving the Garifuna communities of Triunfo de la Cruz and Punta Piedra. In 2026, a new ruling related to Cayos Cochinos was added. In total, the Inter-American Court has issued four rulings against Honduras regarding violations of the rights of Garifuna communities.
For this reason, OFRANEH maintains that any proposed debate should not consider renegotiating rights that have already been recognized. The organization rejected the call by Supreme Court Chief Justice Wagner Vallecillo for a roundtable dialogue to address the conflict. It characterized it as a false dialogue because, they argue, it seeks to present as a dispute between parties an issue that has already been resolved by international courts.
Restoring the Land Rights of the Garifuna African People of Honduras
The judiciary, for its part, defended the call for dialogue and maintained that it seeks to find solutions to the territorial issue. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights attended the meeting and reiterated that effective compliance with the Inter-American Court’s rulings is essential to guarantee the territorial rights of the Garifuna people. It also warned that criminal law should not be used to resolve historical territorial conflicts.
However, the conflict is not confined to the courts. OFRANEH also condemned a campaign of hate speech against the Garifuna people. One of the individuals singled out by the organization is journalist Amílcar Ulises Aguirre Ramírez of the Televicentro network, who, according to the organization, denied that the Garifuna are an indigenous people of Honduras and perpetuated racist stereotypes about their communities.
The debate over who the Garifuna are is also nothing new. They are an Afro-indigenous people with a unique history of resistance and displacement. Their communities are located primarily along the Caribbean coast of Honduras, and for decades they have been demanding protection for their territories, their culture, and their ways of life. The Honduran government acknowledged its international obligations by ratifying, among other instruments, Convention No. 169 of the International Labor Organization.
The territorial aspect is central. The communities report that lands along the Caribbean coast are under pressure from tourism projects, business interests, and other economic forces. In the case of San Juan, the disputed land is claimed by a company linked to the Rosenthal family, according to documentation and complaints gathered by Garifuna organizations.
For OFRANEH, the criminalization of defenders, the land dispute, and the spread of racist rhetoric against the communities are not isolated incidents. They are part of the same power structure that transforms those who defend their territories into alleged criminals while the economic interests in those lands remain intact. The term used by the organization is even more serious. OFRANEH denounced the existence of a plan of dispossession and cultural genocide against the Garifuna people and announced that it will once again turn to international bodies to demand that Honduras comply with the rulings of the Inter-American Court. Meanwhile, the Viva Berta Camp remains in front of the Supreme Court. The community is already familiar with the path through international courts. It is now taking that path once again because, although the rulings exist, the dispossession has not yet ended.
