Guatemalan bishop known as mining critic receives death threat

Published: 2008-04-15

GUATEMALA CITY (CNS) -- While a Franciscan nun was walking along a road leading to the main highway in Tajumulco, Guatemala, she was approached by a masked man in a car with dark sunglasses. He pressed a gun into her side. The man told the nun, who works in the Diocese of San Marcos, "Tell that good-for-nothing bishop -- Ramazzini -- that his days are numbered and that he should stop getting involved in things that are none of his business." He was referring to Bishop Alvaro Ramazzini Imeri of San Marcos, an outspoken critic of environmentally harmful mining practices in his rural Diocese of San Marcos and a defender of human rights. After the incident, the man sped off down the road. The nun, whose identity is being withheld for her protection, was not hurt. When asked who he thought issued the death threat, Bishop Ramazzini declined to speculate. "This could have come from any number of people who may not be happy with me," he told Catholic News Service at the Guatemalan bishops' conference headquarters in Guatemala City April 8.

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