Organizations Ask Canadian Embassy to Uphold Human Rights Commitments in Panama

PANAMA CITY, Panama — Representatives of social movements and environmental organizations met today to deliver a report, Human Rights Violations, Abuses, and Incidents Registered During the Protests Against the Mining Contract in Panamá, October-November 2023, to the Canadian Embassy in Panama City. 

Delegates from the Foundation for Integral Community Development and the Conservation of Ecosystems in Panama (FUNDICCEP), the National Network in Defense of Water, Warriors of the Sea, and Enough is Enough, among other socio-environmental movements in the country, went to the Canadian Embassy to deliver a physical copy of the report. 

The report documents hundreds of injuries, four deaths, more than 1,500 cases of arbitrary detentions, and 23 cases of activists and protesters who face criminalization and legal trials that all occurred during and after protests last year. The report also documents other punitive measures and repression towards groups participating in the national strike, such as teachers and union members. 

Environmental defenders in Panama have been criminalized and investigated. At the same time, First Quantum, a Toronto-based mining company that acquired the mining project in 2013, has committed devastating environmental harms in its illegitimate operations. Supreme Court decisions have declared two consecutive contracts unconstitutional.

“Panamanians have repeatedly and firmly said that they do not approve of the development of metallic mining, as biodiversity and water are the most important resources in the country,” said Damaris Sanchez Samudio of FUNDICCEP. “That said, we denounce and reject all aggression towards environmental defenders for protecting forests, rivers, coasts, and mangroves, and for protecting life.”

Despite the human rights abuses documented in the report, the Canadian government has stated that it supports First Quantum. First Quantum has said it hopes to agree to reopen the mine with Panama’s new government. 

Faced with this insistent mining lobby that ignores the voice of the Panamanian people, the delegates demand that the Canadian government:

1. Activate the Voices at Risk guidelines to protect the rights of environmental defenders who have been criminalized and investigated in Panama due to the protests against the imposition of the project of Minera Panama, a subsidiary of First Quantum Minerals. 
2. Put out an official statement supporting the country’s environmental laws and the right to protest, and state that it does not support the criminalization of environmental defenders.
3. Seek information about the criminalization and judicialization processes of defenders, participate in the ongoing hearings, and recommend that the company stop undertaking investigations against Panamanian citizens who have exercised their right to protest.
4. Withdraw economic, political, and commercial support for the company Minera Panamá for the grave environmental damages that occurred, violations of the Constitution of Panama, and influencing the criminalization of social protest in the country.
5. Prioritize human rights and the rights of nature over those of companies. 
6. I support the government of Panama in upholding the Supreme Court of Justice’s decision to declare Law 406 unconstitutional.

“The Canadian Embassy in Panama must uphold the human rights commitments of the Canadian government by supporting environmental defenders who are being criminalized for exercising their right to protest peacefully,” said Paulina Personius, Making Clean Energy Clean international campaigner for Earthworks. “It must revoke support for First Quantum, whose contract was declared unconstitutional twice by the Supreme Court and which does not have a social license to operate.”