Where Impunity Reigns: Nickel Mining in El Estor, Guatemala

• Author: James Rodríguez
• Published date: 01 January 2021
• Date: 01 January 2021
• DOI: 10.1177/0094582X20982548
• Subject Matter: Photo Essay

https://doi.org/10.1177/0094582X20982548

LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES, Issue 236, Vol. 48 No. 1, January 2021, 289–299

DOI: 10.1177/0094582X20982548

© 2020 Latin American Perspectives

289

Photo Essay

Where Impunity Reigns

Nickel Mining in El Estor, Guatemala

by

James Rodríguez

Along the northern edge of Lake Izabal, Guatemala’s largest body of water,

a nickel-mining project has been the source of continuous land and social con-

flict for nearly 60 years. Originally known as the EXMIBAL Mine, it started as

a subsidiary of Canadian INCO (International Nickel Company) after military

governments handed the former mining giant a 40-year lease on 385 square

kilometers in 1965. This land was in Q’eqchi’ Mayan territory, and the project

James Rodríguez is a documentary photographer and multimedia journalist based in Guatemala

since 2006. His work focuses on human rights issues, primarily postwar processes, land tenure

conflicts, and migration. It has been published in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times Lens,

Le Monde, and El País, among others. He is currently working on a COVID-19-related photo proj-

ect funded by the National Geographic Society.

982548LAPXXX10.1177/0094582X20982548Latin American PerspectivesRodríguez / Photo Essay

other2020

Two young men fishing at dawn on Lake Izabal near the Fenix nickel-mining project in El

Estor, Guatemala, September 28, 2014. Photo © James Rodríguez