On the 30th of April, 2008, the small community of Santo Domingo Ixcatlán, located in the Mixteca region of the State of Oaxaca, southern Mexico, was shaken by the news of a triple homicide. Amnesty International reported that dozens of armed men headed by the former Mayor of Ixcatlán, Freddy Eucario Morales Arias, brutally murdered three members of the community: Gustavo Castañeda Hernández, Melesio Martínez Robles and Inocencio Medina Bernabé.

PBI has accompanied human rights defenders who have been attacked or who are under threat over the last 30 years across a variety of countries. We respond to petitions for help made by people and civil society organisations who request international accompaniment whilst carrying out non-violent work in promoting and defending human rights, particularly when those human rights have been violated or when they are under threat.

Washington, DC., 4 April 2011 – During its final period of sessions, which ends today, the IACHR announced the creation of a Rapporteurship on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders. The Rapporteur will be Commissioner José de Jesús Orozco Henríquez, from Mexico.