9 50. The Garífuna people date back to the Eighteenth Century and are the result of syncretism between indigenous and African peoples. In 1635, two ships carrying people from Africa to work as slaves were shipwrecked off the island of Saint Vincent. At the time, the island was inhabited by descendants of the Arawak Indian people and the Kalinagu indigenous people. The latter, who were originally from South America, had invaded the island in the Thirteenth Century. The descendants of the fusion between indigenous and African people were called Karaphunas. In 1797, Great Britain took control of the island of Saint Vincent and the Karaphunas were deported to the island of Roatán. From Roatán, they emigrated to the mainland of what today constitutes Honduran territory, through Trujillo and 8 all along the northern coast of Honduras and toward the Caribbean shores of Guatemala and Belize. 51. The union between Africans and Amerindians in Saint Vincent made the Garífunas a specific ethnic group and culture. The Garífunas see themselves as an indigenous people with an African 9 culture. 52. The Garífuna people lives in 46 rural communities along the Atlantic shore or Caribbean coast, in the departments of Cortés, Atlántida, Colón, and Gracias a Dios and increasingly large numbers of Garífunas live in cities, such as La Ceiba, Tela, Cortés, Trujillo, San Pedro Sula, and Tegucigalpa. Between 50,000 and 100,000 Honduran Garífunas are thought to be living in the United States, especially 10 in New York. 53. The Garífuna people in Honduras has maintained its own cultural manifestations, its social and cultural organization and institutions, its way of life, cosmovision, practices, customs, 11 ceremonial rites, language, clothing, and its special relation to the earth. 54. For the Garífuna people, the earth is fundamental for its survival, there is a permanent shared experience with the earth in harmony with the natural resources in its territory. This close relationship is reflected in the Garífuna people’s belief that “the earth is the mother, is life, […] A 12 Garífuna without land is not a Garífuna, a Garífuna without sea is not a Garífuna” . 55. The Garífunas maintain traditional community ways of working the land and other work patterns and activities that reflect their origins, their homeland on the Northern coast of Honduras, and 8 See inter alia Caribbean Central America Research Council. Diagnostic Study on Land Use and Tenancy in the Garífuna and Miskito Communities of Honduras 2002-2003. Available at: http://ccarconline.org/Honduraseng.htm. p. 31; Testimony of Gregoria Flores Martínez in the Alfredo Lopéz v. Honduras Case provided at the public hearing on the merits and possible reparations and costs held before the Inter-American Court on June 28 and 29, 2005; I/A Court H.R. López Álvarez v. Honduras. Judgment of February 1st, 2006. Series C No. 141; paragraph 54.1; Annex 1. The Inspection Panel of the World Bank. Investigation Report on Honduras: Land Administration Program. Investigation Report No. 39933-HN. June 12, 2007. pp. 17-19. Attached to the petitioner’s written communication of October 13, 2008, received by the IACHR on October 15, 2008; Ethnic Poverty in Honduras, Utta von Gleich and Ernesto Gálvez. Indigenous Peoples and Community Development Unit. Inter-American Development Bank, Department of Sustainability. Washington, D.C., September 1999. Available at: http://www.bvsde.paho.org/bvsacd/cd47/etnica.pdf; Presented to the Sub-commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights. Working Group on Minorities. United Nations. 10th Session. 1 – 5 March, 2004. Available at: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Minorities/Pages/10WGMinorities.aspx 9 Testimony of Gregoria Flores Martínez in the Alfredo Lopéz v. Honduras Case provided at the public hearing on the merits and possible reparations and costs held before the Inter-American Court on June 28 and 29, 2005. 10 Ethnic poverty in Honduras, Utta von Gleich and Ernesto Gálvez. Indigenous Peoples and Community Development Unit. Inter-American Development Bank, Department of Sustainability. Washington, D.C., September 1999. p. 2. Annex 1. The Inspection Panel of the World Bank. Investigation Report on Honduras: Land Administration Program. Investigation Report No. 39933-HN. June 12, 2007. p. 20. Attached to the petitioner’s written communication of October 13, 2008, received by the IACHR on October 15, 2008. 11 Annex 2. Study by the Caribbean Central America Research Council on the “Ethnography of the Triunfo de la Cruz Community”. Appendix 1 of the petitioner’s written communication of May 23, 2006, received by the IACHR on May 30, 2006. 12 Testimony of Gregoria Flores Martínez in the Alfredo Lopéz v. Honduras Case provided at the public hearing on the merits and possible reparations and costs held before the Inter-American Court on June 28 and 29, 2005. See inter alia Annex 3. A legal opinion on the situation of the Garífuna territories of Honduras, in particular the Triunfo and Tornabé communities. Appendix 26 of the petitioner’s written communication of May 23, 2006, received by the IACHR on May 30, 2006.