The Consul General of Spain in La Paz, Guillermo Gil, visited the Spanish activist Amparo Carvajal this past Thursday, who has been holding a vigil for 50 days for the recovery of the headquarters of the Permanent Assembly of Human Rights of Bolivia (APDHB), taken over by a group related to the ruling party.

Amparo Carvajal? Who is this Spaniard that the consul is visiting and what fight is she carrying out in Bolivia? For many Bolivians, she is a hero, to the point that some citizen platform has requested the Nobel Peace Prize for her.

From Riano to La Paz

Amparo Carvajal was born in 1939 in Riaño (León) in a family with 13 siblings.. She was already 32 years old when she arrived in Bolivia in November 1971 as a Mercedarian missionary from Bérritz.. Nine years later, in March 1980, she left the congregation (the rest of her companions left the country).. And yet, they keep calling her “madrecita”.

“She is still here, dedicated to a coherent fight in favor of human rights, regardless of the government in power, military or civilian, right or left,” the Jesuit priest, linguist, researcher and Spanish anthropologist, Xavier Albó (died in Cochabamba on January 20 of this year) wrote of her in 2016.

She is still here, dedicated to a coherent fight in favor of human rights, whatever the government in power”

Since 1971 Bolivia lived in the midst of the dictatorship of General Hugo Banzer, who had carried out a coup. In 1974, Carvajal was one of the co-founders of the Permanent Assembly of Human Rights of Bolivia (APDHB), which replaced the Episcopal Commission for Justice and Peace, dependent on the Catholic Church, dismantled by the dictator (for telling the truth of the Valle Massacre in detail: the Army dispersed the peasant crowd with bursts of machine guns and shots).

APDHB, a combative organization

The APDHB is ecumenical and, therefore, freer from episcopal control. In this way, it has been able to denounce the repression of the military dictatorships. Already in democracy, it has been a center of protest against neoliberal policies. At that point there were internal divisions.

“In the last decade, Amparo has had to face a delicate situation due to the division of the APDHB, a division that began when Sacha Llorenti was its executive director, years before the time of Evo Morales, but which has hardened with the MAS,” said Albó, a specialist in the study of nations and indigenous peoples and rural Bolivian populations.

The MAS (Movement to Socialism) is the political party founded in 1997 by Morales, which has governed Bolivia from 2006 to 2019, and then, in November 2020, with the victory of Luis Arce. The divisions within the APDHB became more palpable during the MAS governments, but also with the fall of Morales in 2019.

As Albó says, “it is quite common everywhere that human rights organizations handle themselves more easily in the face of a clear enemy (for example, a military dictatorship) than when the abuses come from a democratic government”. A few weeks ago Amparo Carvajal was re-elected president of the APDHB.

It's already 50 days of vigil

However, the Spanish company has lost the headquarters of its organization: it has been occupied. On June 2, a group led by Édgar Salazar, affiliated with MAS, the government party, took over the headquarters of the APDHB. This coming, the octogenarian has completed 50 days of vigil in order to recover the property and has been equipped on the roof for ten days. “I, until I die, I'm going to stay here. I don't have access to a bathroom, I don't have anything. Many years ago, someone told me: Amparo, Bolivia has nice laws, but they are not enforced and that is what happened with this freedom action,” said Carvajal.

“They seek to silence the voices of protest, corruption, violation of human rights, but it has the purpose of not having opposition. The Government has been systematically selecting who it is going to imprison, persecute (…). It has learned the lesson of the dictators to appease and close the mouth and the attitudes of struggle and submission, voices of protest, voices of denunciation,” says the former leader of the Bolivian Central Obrera, Lucio Gonzáles Alanes, to the newspaper Los Tiempos.

Physical and psychological torture

Voices critical of the MAS assure that Carvajal has resorted to pressure from related groups and the Police, with the aim of removing her from the House of Human Rights and restricting her activities in defense of fundamental rights.. In the case of the Spanish woman, “systematic torture” has been denounced, despite the existence of a judicial resolution to stop the “psychological violence and threats” by Salazar.

It is about physical and psychological torture against Amparo sponsored by the same Government because it has guarded the offices of the Assembly and does not allow access to anyone “

Lawyer Eusebio Vera explained that all the actions carried out by the organization's parallel leadership are like a process of “systematic torture by the MAS government in order to gain control of the APDHB.”. Vera maintains that “it is physical and psychological torture against Amparo sponsored by the same government because it has guarded the offices of the Assembly and does not allow access to anyone.”

No solution to the conflict

In a summit that brings together ombudsmen from 22 countries in Cochabamba, the second deputy of the Ombudsman of Spain, Patricia Bárcena, has preferred not to refer to the extreme situation of Carvajal. “We cannot supervise or give lessons to other States (on the defense of human rights) or refer to any particular case,” Bárcena said.

The Bolivian Ombudsman has ruled in favor of Carvajal. He has presented a report to a La Paz judge to order the execution of the resolution he issued last week to protect the human rights of the activist. However, there is no solution to the conflict.

“His health is at risk, he does not have access to hygienic services, any mishap that happens is the responsibility of the Government,” the president of the Apdhb of La Paz, Javier Quisberth, told Efe. Carvajal, according to the agency, “is out in the open and wears diapers because he can't use the bathroom at the headquarters that is taken over by Salazar's group.”