In the early hours of Friday, February 22, Vicente Vera Párraga, achivist and secretary of the newly re-launched Collective Coccinelle was murdered. The circumstances of the murder of 60 year old Vicente Vera Párraga, are not clear; however, signs of violence were found, indicating that his murder was for a homophobic criminal attack.

“La Verito”, as his colleagues called Vicente , had recently been campaigning to get the government of Ecuador to acknowledge the abuses that were committed against trans members of the LGBT community in the 80’s and 90’s when they suffered repression, imprisonment, torture, disappearances and assassinations by the National Police.

The Ecuadorian State has not yet acknowledged its crimes of serious human rights violations that it committed the trans groups in that period, nor has it been concerned with recognizing them and giving them comprehensive compensation. That is why “La Verito” and her companions organised meetings to seek to speed up their cases through various official mediation processes to obtain justice.

“The Regional Foundation of Legal Advice INREDH and the Coccinelle Collective strongly condemn the violence that took the life of its secretary; we demand that the state bring those responsible to justice, and accelerate the processes for the recognition and reparation of the Coccinelle collective, since the constant climate of repression forces them to live in situations of constant risk. At the same time, we hope that the state will not be indifferent to the violence that members of the Coccinelle Collective have lived and are currently living in.