Teodomira Rosales Sierra
Organization
José María Morelos y Pavón Regional Center for the Defense of Human Rights
Activity
The right to defend rights
THE FACTS – We denounce the robbery and physical, patrimonial and sexual violence committed against the lawyer and indigenous human rights defender Teodomira Rosales Sierra by agents of the Ministry of Public Security of Guerrero.
On December 28, 2019, state agents of the Ministry of Public Security used threats and blows to block the passage of Teodomira Rosales Sierra and other members of the José María Morelos y Pavón Regional Center for the Defense of Human Rights at their headquarters in Chilapa de Álvarez. The comrades were accompanying the famílies of displaced and temporarily housed persons in the community of Chichicualco in the town of Leonard Bravo in the state of Guerrero, and had requested dialogue with the National Guard over the continuation of its presence in Chichicualco due to fear that armed groups might come down from the mountain and occupy the community.
In the course of events, Teodomira Rosales Sierra received blows and was held at gunpoint by a state police agent who threatened to do her even greater harm. Agents also searched her body for arms, raising up her blouse and pulling down the brassier and panty hose she was wearing in front of community people, even though she had identified herself as a human rights defender. They also stole víctim documentation, money, computers, cell phones, work material and clothes from Teodomira and the other human rights defenders. Moreover, Guerrero state police agents destroyed the vehicle in which the defenders were riding.
In view of the highly serious nature of these acts, we of IM-Defensoras and the National Network of Women Human Rights Defenders in Mexico urgently demand the implementation of measures to guarantee the safety and security of the Tlapanecan defender Teodomira Rosales Sierra and other members of the José María Morelos y Pavón Regional Center for the Defense of Human Rights. We also demand a rigorous, transparent investigation of the attacks against our comrade defender and sancions against the state agents that perpetrated them. In the same vein, we demand the immediate replacement of the objects, work materials and other stolen property and reparations for all harm that was done.
