命懸けでチョウを保護　メキシコ

【ＡＦＰ＝時事】メキシコは環境保護活動家にとって、最も危険な国の一つだ。チョウの保護活動家、オメロ・ゴメスさんは、２年前に殺害されたとみられている。しかし、その精神は今なお生き続けている。（写真はメキシコ・ミチョアカン州のエルロサリオ・オオカバマダラ保護区の監視員）
　中西部ミチョアカン州のチョウ保護区、エルロサリオ。面積は約２５００ヘクタール。モミの木の林に「オオカバマダラ」の大群が飛来する。
　オレンジと黒の羽が特徴で、ミチョアカン州で冬を越すため、毎年カナダから数千キロを移動してくる。
　農業技師だったゴメスさんは、人生の大部分を保護区の保全と監視にささげていた。その活動は国際的にも知られていた。
　しかし、２０２０年１月、井戸の底から遺体となって発見された。殺害された可能性が高いとみられている。
　数日後、同じくチョウの保護活動家、ラウル・エルナンデスさんの遺体も州内で見つかった。暴行を受けた痕があった。
　ミチョアカン州では、複数の犯罪集団が活動している。エルロサリオの監視員は、違法伐採業者の脅威にもさらされている。
　国際ＮＧＯ「グローバル・ウィットネス」によると、ゴメスさんを含め、２０２０年にメキシコで殺害された環境保護活動家は３０人に上る。環境保護活動家にとって、メキシコはコロンビアに次いで危険な国となっている。
　環境保護活動家が殺害された事件のほぼ３分の１は違法伐採業者によるものだ。半分は先住民族を狙ったものという。同ＮＧＯは、犯罪者の最大９５％は罰せられていないと指摘している。
　ミチョアカン州の検察は、ゴメスさんの死因は水死としている。頭部に外傷もあった。ＡＦＰは検察に取材を申し込んだが、返答はなかった。
　ゴメスさんの妻レベカ・バレンシアさんはＡＦＰに「事故じゃない、彼は殺された」と訴えた。捜査は遅々として進まず、真実が隠蔽（いんぺい）されるのではないかと危惧している。
　オレガリオ・サンチェスさんはパトロールに同行したＡＦＰ記者に対し、ゴメスさんが残したものは今でも「私たちの心の中にある」と話した。
　サンチェスさんによると、監視員は現在２６０人。「（ゴメスさんと）同じ道をたどり、監視と森林再生活動を続けていく」と語った。
　監視員は１０人のグループで行動する。マチェーテ（なた）で武装している監視員もおり、違法伐採業者や腹をすかせた家畜、山火事からモミやマツの木を守っている。昼夜のシフト体制で、時には２０キロ歩く。不審な行為を見つければ、当局に通報する。警察も遊歩道の安全に目を光らせている。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/03/16-10:56）

In the fir forests of Mexico, one of the world's most dangerous countries for environmentalists, the legacy of butterfly defender Homero Gomez lives on two years after his suspected murder.
Despite the dangers of standing up to illegal loggers, fellow conservationists continue Gomez's work guarding the El Rosario monarch butterfly sanctuary in Mexico's central highlands.
The agricultural engineer dedicated much of his life to protecting the habitat of the iconic orange and black insects, which migrate several thousand kilometers (miles) each year to Mexico, fleeing the Canadian winter.
His legacy is in all of us, Olegario Sanchez told AFP during a patrol through the mountains of the El Rosario sanctuary, where swarms of butterflies delight visitors with majestic aerial dances.
The body of Gomez, who had gained international recognition for his activism and management of the sanctuary, was found at the bottom of a well in January 2020 in the state of Michoacan, where monarch butterflies spend the winter.
Days later, the dead body of another butterfly conservationist, Raul Hernandez, was found bearing signs of violence in Michoacan, which is home to several criminal gangs.
The prosecution's ongoing investigation suggests that Gomez, 50, was murdered.
He was one of 30 environmentalists killed in Mexico in 2020, according to rights group Global Witness.
The death toll soared 67 percent from 2019, making Mexico the second-deadliest country for environmentalists behind Colombia.
Almost a third of the attacks in Mexico were linked to logging, and half targeted Indigenous communities, Global Witness said.
Impunity was shockingly high, with up to 95 percent of murders going unprosecuted, it added.
- 'It was murder' -
The Michoacan prosecutor's office, which did not respond to AFP's request for an interview, said that Gomez died due to mechanical suffocation due to submersion... with traumatic brain injury.
His family have no doubt that he was killed by criminals pillaging the forest that he loved.
It wasn't an accident. It was murder, Gomez's widow Rebeca Valencia told AFP, voicing fears of a cover-up given the lack of progress in the investigation.
In the El Rosario sanctuary, near one of the many clusters of resting butterflies that hang from oyamel fir trees, Gomez's companions smiled wistfully at his memory.
He was a person with a lot of spirit, said Sanchez, adding that the activist's strength would live on through his fellow conservationists.
There are 260 of us (community guards) and we keep going along the same path of surveillance and reforestation, Sanchez said.
The wildlife defenders, some armed with machetes, walk up to 20 kilometers each shift, day and night, in groups of 10 to protect fir and pine trees from loggers as well as hungry livestock and fires.
When they detect suspicious activity, they report it to the authorities.
Police also stand guard on tourist trails in the sanctuary, which covers around 2,500 hectares (6,000 acres).
Together with other overwintering sites, it forms Mexico's Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve -- a UNESCO World Heritage site visited by millions of the insects each year.
- 'Immensely sad' -
In Mexico's central state of Hidalgo, Filiberta Nevado also refuses to abandon her work protecting the Zacacuautla forest despite the risks of confronting criminals lured in particular by its pine trees to use for carpentry.
In October 2020, a logger approached her to say: If anything happens to me, I'll kill you!
Nevado, 66, showed apparent evidence of illegal activities during a tour of the area, pointing to dozens of tree trunks scattered on a dirt road.
Men wielding chainsaws were seen leaving when they saw visiting journalists.
In front of dozens of stumps of felled trees, Nevado lamented that her efforts to denounce loggers, helped by tip-offs from neighbors, were usually in vain.
It makes me immensely sad, and not for my generation... but for the generations to come, she said.