Ecobreves – HONDURAS: Court Says OK to Building in Nature Reserve

By - - and IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

TEGUCIGALPA, Nov 3 2007 (IPS) - The Honduran Supreme Court of Justice upheld the construction of housing in the area of La Tigra National Park, a preserve that serves as the capital's environmental lungs. With more than one million inhabitants, Tegucigalpa also gets its water from this mountainous reserve, where several watersheds converge.

The decision “is a blow for the environment, because the fragility of the capital will be overexposed,” Dolores Valenzuela, of the Honduran Association of Environmental Journalists, told Tierramérica.

“The Mountain Chalet” project was approved four years ago, but when the new government came to power two years ago, the Environment Secretariat expressed its opposition, alleging that the permit had not followed the environmental legal procedures. It appealed to the Supreme Court, which on Oct. 30 gave the green light to construction despite protests from environmentalists.