AURA LOLITA CHAVEZ IXCAQUIC

 AURA LOLITA CHAVEZ IXCAQUIC

Aura Lolita Chávez Ixcaquic (born 1972), known as Lolita, is a is a human rights, women's rights activist and Guatemalan indigenous leader, an international leader in the struggle to preserve natural resources.

She is a member of the Council of the Ki’che Populations (CPK), an organization founded in 2007, to face the consequences of the free trade agreement between the Dominican Republic and Central America. She, and the organisation she represents, fight for the rights of the Maya Quiché people and the preservation of the ecosystem in which they have lived for millennia against the expansion of the mining, logging, hydro-electric and farming industries in the land.

The Ki’ches symbolize the struggle for environmental human rights in today’s world. They have been subject to a genocidal campaign made of rapes, deaths, cultural alienation and the grab of their lands during the civil war of Guatemala (1960-1996). The present and past violations of human rights, though, have remained unpunished.

Due to her active involvement in mobilizations and activities opposing extractives activities, Lolita suffered several attacks and threats since 2012.

In July 2017, Lolita and other members of the Council  for Quiché Peoples managed to block a truck which was transporting wood without an exploitation licence. In reprisal, Lolita and her companions faced death threats. The Guatemalan government has been unwilling to protect them and Lolita had to flee her country for her security and take refuge in Spain, in the Basque Lands.

She left Guatemala after surviving a sixth assassination attempt for her activism as a rights defender and community leader. In the last attempt on her life, a group of armed men shot at a vehicle she was traveling in. The men were linked to the Guatemalan logging company engaged in the illegal logging that Chávez was protesting.

She has not been able to return to Guatemala since 2017. Her six months in exile have stretched to several years because the Guatemalan government still cannot guarantee her safety. Those who tried to kill her remain free and therefore remain a threat to her life and the lives of her children and the rest of her family. During her exile, she continues to promote the rights of Indigenous Peoples and indigenous women, and denounce the situation in Guatemala. 

In October 2017 the European Parliament shortlisted Ms Chavez for the Sakharov Human Rights Prize along with three other finalists. In January 2018 Lolita also received the Ignacio Ellacuría Prize from the Basque government for her work of defending the land of the K'iche people from exploitation.

https://en.gariwo.net/righteous/shoah-and-nazism/aura-lolita-chavez-19643.html