Honduras Arrests Ex-Mayor in Activist Lopez Killing

Honduran authorities arrested former Tocoa mayor Adán Fúnez and two other men on Tuesday, accusing them of masterminding the 2024 assassination of environmental activist Juan López in the northern city of Tocoa.

Fúnez, a prominent local politician, businessman Héctor Eduardo Méndez and Juan Ángel Ramos Gallegos face charges of criminal association linked to the killing. Prosecutors identified the three as the intellectual authors of López's death, according to Public Ministry spokesperson Yuri Mora. Their trial is scheduled to begin in June.

López, a leading anticorruption advocate, was shot six times in the chest and once in the head by a masked gunman in September 2024, days after publicly calling for Fúnez to resign amid a corruption scandal. At the time, Fúnez supported an iron oxide mining project in the Colón department of northwestern Honduras, which López and other activists opposed over threats to dense jungles, crystalline waters and protected reserves.

The slaying drew international condemnation, including calls for justice from Pope Francis, the United Nations and the administration of then-U.S. President Joe Biden. It echoed the 2016 murder of environmentalist Berta...