Inter-American Commission on Human Rights calls upon Peruvian State to protect the Shipibo-Konibo community of Santa Clara de Uchunya 

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has granted precautionary measures to the indigenous Shipibo-Konibo community Santa Clara de Uchunya and to  the Federation of Native Communities of Ucayali (FECONAU), in the Peruvian Amazon.

For years, the Indigenous community and FECONAU have faced intimidation, threats and attacks for taking a stand against the large-scale deforestation of their ancestral territory for oil palm expansion. On 12 August 2020, they requested the precautionary measures from the IACHR. Such measures are the urgent mechanism by which the IACHR requests that States take action and put in place safeguards to protect the human rights of communities and individuals in grave risk of further serious harm and abuse by state and non-state actors.

In its decision issued on 28 October 2020, the IACHR determined that based on the evidence presented by the community and the Peruvian State, members of the community and FECONAU face grave, urgent and irreparable risks and “imminent harms to their rights".

Consequently, the IACHR has called upon the Peruvian State to:

• adopt culturally appropriate measures to protect the lives and safety of the community and FECONAU members from acts of violence by third parties, in line with international human rights law;
• arrange the measures to be adopted with the beneficiaries and their representatives; and
• report on the actions implemented to investigate the events that led to the adoption of the precautionary measures and thus avoid their repetition.

In their submission to the IACHR, the community described how the Peruvian Government’s failure to fully title Santa Clara’s lands has allowed third parties  and  the palm oil company Plantaciones de Pucallpa SAC (now Ocho Sur P SAC) to illegitimately dispossess the community of its traditionally-owned and internationally protected lands. 

Since 2014, community members and leaders who have made a stand to protect their territory have been subjected to verbal abuse,  told  to abandon their homes, received death threats and been shot at on multiple occasions. The submission also recounts the numerous attempts made by the community to denounce the violence and degradation of traditional lands  to Peruvian authorities and international human rights bodies.

In its analysis of the case, the IACHR recalls how the community has resisted, presenting at least 15 criminal complaints and securing high-level interventions from  the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) and the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders, who have called upon the State to protect the community. However, the IACHR notes that "despite judicial and administrative decisions taken to respond to the problem, the alleged situation of risk has continued throughout time".

Despite the fact that "diverse State institutions have warned about the situation of the community faced with the irregular behaviours of the company, its workers, persons linked to it and local authorities", the IACHR observes that "there have not been substantive advances to sanction those responsible." The IACHR notes that "by implementing the respective sanctions, the State would send a message of no tolerance for actions against the proposed beneficiaries".

With regards to the various legal actions taken by the community during the past five years in defence of their rights and territory, the IACHR signals that "while such actions remain pending or ongoing, new risk events are likely to occur. In particular, a decision from the Constitutional Tribunal remains pending, as well as other criminal complaints which are still under investigation."

Efer Silvano Soria, chief of Santa Clara de Uchunya, said, “We hope that the Peruvian State complies with these measures to ensure our safety. Until now, despite having received personal safety guarantees from the State, the police haven’t paid a single visit to my home. They haven’t even called or messaged me. They could come here easily, yet nobody has done so.

Álvaro Másquez Salvador, legal specialist with the Institute for Legal Defense, said, “The precautionary measures for Santa Clara de Uchunya and FECONAU are particularly important in a context in which violence against Indigenous defenders has increased right across the Amazon. The IACHR’s decision underscores that this case reflects a serious and urgent context, in which the Peruvian State’s response has been weak and extremely limited.”

“The IACHR decided to grant the precautionary measures because it warned that Santa Clara de Uchunya are facing a situation marked by impunity. The community listed all of the denunciations and requests for protection presented across a period of six years, which the Peruvian State has failed to resolve. The Ucayali Regional Government authorities are still yet to be sanctioned for the dispossession of the community and the case of Ocho Sur P is even worse - the company continues operating despite multiple proofs showing its illegality,” Másquez Salvador added.

The IACHR provided the Peruvian Government with 15 days to report back about the adoption of the required precautionary measures.

A recent analysis found that since 2012, some 15,721 hectares of the community’s forests have been destroyed - an area three times the size of Bermuda. The oil palm plantation owned by Ocho Sur P SAC operates on at least 6,845 hectares of these lands, as deforestation of the lands surrounding the plantation continues to increase.

As detailed in a recent report published by FPP and corroborated by a detailed investigation published by Convoca, Ocho Sur P and sister company Ocho Sur U are both wholly owned by Bermudan company, Peruvian Palm Holdings Ltd. Ocho Sur’s operations in Ucayali have received investment from US-based investors Anholt Services (USA) Inc. and Amerra Capital Management LLC.

Photo: IACHR