Environmental activist Berta Cáceres won the Goldman Environmental Prize in 2015 for successfully halting the Agua Zarca project, a massive hydropower development along the Gualcarque River in her native Honduras. On March 3, 2016, 10 years ago this month, gunmen hired by executives of the company building the dam assassinated her for her activism. Since then, Berta has become a global symbol of courage and sacrifice in the face of greed and violence. Her legacy is powerful, but her martyrdom for simply protecting her community is unacceptable. In January, an independent group of experts appointed by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights released a comprehensive report on the assassination. They found that Berta’s murder was the result of a coordinated criminal operation to defeat opposition to the Agua Zarca project. Worse, international development funds intended for the hydroelectric project were diverted to the purchase of Indigenous land, surveillance, armed incursions, and Berta’s murder. Berta’s assassination is not an isolated case. Many environmental defenders’ stories resemble David vs. Goliath, as they frequently tangle with powerful, well-funded industries and governments — and the webs of corruption that sometimes link them. According to Global Witness, 2,253 environmental activists have been killed worldwide since 2012, and many more have been victimized. In September 2025, Global Witness reported that at least 146 land and environmental defenders were killed or disappeared in 2024, with a plurality in Latin America. According to the World Economic Forum, at least 175 park rangers were killed in the line of duty across 41 countries in the…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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