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Colleague of slain Honduran activist shot dead

Xinhua, March 17, 2016 Adjust font size:

Another activist was shot dead in Honduras on the heels of the murder of the country's famous campaigner Berta Caceres, local media reported Wednesday.

Unidentified gunmen on Tuesday shot Nelson Garcia four times in the head as he walked home to Rio Lindo, northwestern Honduras, the TV network TeleSUR reported.

Garcia, who was leading a protest in the nearby municipality of Rio Chiquito, returned home after he was evicted from the protest by the army, the report said.

Around 150 members of the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras, founded by Caceres, had been sitting in to recover land claimed by the government.

Caceres won the Goldman Environmental Prize in 2015 for her role in fighting a dam project on a river that local indigenous people considered sacred.

She was shot and killed on March 3 by two men at her home in La Esperanza, 180 km west of the capital Tegucigalpa.

Since the murder of Caceres, the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras has been calling for protection for its activists who reportedly have been harassed and interrogated on a regular basis.

U.S. Ambassador to Honduras James Nealon condemned the murder on Tuesday, saying that "following so closely from the assassination of his colleague Berta Caceres, his (Garcia's) death is a particular cause for concern."

Nealon demanded that "the government of Honduras fulfill its pledge to carry out a thorough and fair investigation and that every person linked to the murder be brought to justice." Endi