Unofficial translation by the Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA). You can find the original statement in Spanish further below.

ACODET – ASSOCIATION OF COMMUNITIES FOR THE DEVELOPMENT AND DEFENSE OF LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES

DECLARATION OF THE XVIII ORDINARY GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Coming together in assembly, delegates of communities threatened by the construction of the Xalalá Hydroelectric Project that form ACODET, are analyzing the local and national situation that we are living in. On this occasion, we reaffirm our promise to maintain our organization and continue to care and fight for the sacred territory that makes up the basin of the Chixoy and Copón rivers, as we have been doing for 18 years.

Before the current situation we want to share with the communities of our organization, neighboring communities and sister organizations, some conclusions:

a. Our rivers and territories continue to be coveted and threatened by large companies; electricity companies, oil companies, and palm oil companies. We know that Guatemala is the primary exporter of energy in Central America y that most of the electricity is generated in the departments of Quiché, Alta and Baja Verapaz; but at the same time this is where 80% of us as communities lack this basic service.

b. The harms caused by the exploration and exploitation done by oil companies is still happening in the department of Petén, and the municipalities of Cobán and Chisec. In Ixcán there are active licenses of oil exploration. Despite the shuttering of operations of the PERENCO company in Petén, there are already other companies that are arranging licenses for new concessions of oil exploitation, without having completed a free, prior, and informed consultation in the affected communities.

c. Indigenous people have dispossessed of our best lands for 500 years. Access to land with legal certainty continues to be one of the most urgent demands from our communities. The current administration has opened some spaces for dialogue with indigenous authorities and campesino organizations. In 2024 it signed an agreement to address the agrarian unrest, but there are few advances in its fulfillment and there continue to be violent removals of certain campesino families.

d. Last year there were many meetings to analyze the situation and to collect ideas to formulate a water law. However, the proposal of the law laid out by MARN (Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources) does not take into account the requests of the people. The national indigenous authorities have agreed that we will only support the proposed water law if it guarantees the collective use of this common good and sanctions the companies that abusively contaminate or divert rivers and water sources for commercial use, violating human rights.

e. The adjudication of licenses for the construction of 57 new electricity plants worries us. On the one hand, a new water law is being drafted. On the other, companies are allowed access to our rivers, and the environment is being contaminated to produce more energy to export.

f. We note, with great trepidation, the control that the oligarchy and pacto de corruptos continues to exert over Congress and the judicial system, despite some changes that took place during 2026. For example, the recent backing of Walter Mazariegos as President of USAC (University of San Carlos) by the Constitutional Court, despite evidence of illegalities that occurred during his tenure. It worries us that the current CC does not guarantee rights to indigenous people that are recognized in the Constitution and international conventions.

g. The designation of the new Attorney General does not guarantee that the rule of law will change much in the country, primarily for indigenous people, because of the deterioration that there’s been for many years in the Guatemalan legal system. Indigenous communities will be vigilant of the performance of the Constitutional Court and the Attorney General’s Office.

h. Political campaigns have already started and can be heard from all over. New candidates from the pacto de corruptos have already come forward, with their lies and vote-buying with ill-gotten gains. We remind everyone that access to employment, roads, electricity, social programs, and development are rights for people and obligations for government. We call upon the communities to not let yourselves be divided, tricked, or sell your vote.

i. The use of our lands for organized crime is causing instability and big problems in the communities and is increasing addictions and violence as well as being used to justify the presence of the military in community territory. We recognize the work that the government is doing to combat drug trafficking, but these actions should not be used to disparage communities and criminalize land defense, like what happened recently in Santa María Tzejá, Ixcán. The fight against organized crime should not just be used to destroy small operations. Security forces should also investigate the people that control these criminal organizations, the politicians that receive dirty money for their campaigns, and the administrators of justice that have guaranteed them impunity.

j. We reject the wars that are breaking out all over the world for the control of natural resources. We condemn the anti-immigrant political authorities and criminals of the United States government and their allies, in opposition to indigenous peoples and sovereign nations, and especially against Palestine and Cuba. Our people already suffered a genocide in the 80s, and already know of death by bullet, by bomb, and by hunger. The people of the world have a right to peace, justice, and freedom of determination.

GIVEN ALL OF THE ABOVE WE DEMAND

⇒ That the criminalization and penal persecution of indigenous authorities and land defenders cease. We demand the release political prisoners and the return of those that are exiled.

⇒ No more evictions of indigenous communities in Alta and Baja Verapaz and Izabal.

⇒ We call emphatically upon the government of Guatemala and the Congress of the Republic to respect our right to consultation and free, prior, and informed consent before approving laws or authorizing licenses that affect our territory.

⇒ To the municipal and central governments: attend to the need for roads and energy in our communities, unconditionally, to accept the construction of dams in our territory.

⇒ To the army: do not militarize our communities or link the fight against organized crime with the defense of land.

WATER, LAND, AND ENERGY ARE NOT MERCHANDISE!!

 Indigenous Community of Playita Copón, Uspantán

June 13, 2026

En español: