Four Honduran campesinos were killed and 11 were wounded in an ambush March 29 at the Marañón estate, near the city of Trujillo in the northern department of Colón. The victims were members of the Unified Campesino Movement of the Aguán (MUCA), one of several organizations struggling to gain farmland in the Lower Aguán Valley. MUCA vice president Juan Chinchilla told the Associated Press wire service that the victims "were leaving for work and were traveling in various vehicles where they were attacked by armed men without having a chance to flee or defend themselves." About 50 campesinos have been killed in the Aguán region since 2009, mostly in disputes with major landowners; some died in unexplained violence sometimes attributed to criminal gangs. (AP, March 29, via Univision) (Juan Chinchilla himself was the victim of a kidnapping in January 2011.)

Some 1,500 indigenous campesinos arrived in Guatemala City on March 27 after an eight-day, 214-kilometer walk from Cobán, Alta Verapaz department, to promote their demands for land, debt cancellation and a halt to mining operations. Supporters joined them as they approached the capital, and the number of marchers eventually swelled to about 10,000, forming a line that stretched for 6 km. The protesters announced that they would stay encamped in the central Plaza de la Constitución until their main demands were met.

Thousands of Chileans turned out in Santiago on March 30 for the funeral of Daniel Zamudio, a young gay man killed by a group of neo-Nazis. Many people brought flowers and signed petitions calling for an end to discrimination; almost 100 vehicles accompanied the cortege from the Zamudio family's home to the General Cemetery. Rightwing president Sebastían Piñera responded to the news of Zamudio's death by announcing "the government's total commitment against all arbitrary discrimination and for a more tolerant country." After criticism from the Homosexual Integration and Liberation Movement (Movilh), even the conservative Episcopal Conference of the Catholic Church finally denounced "the intolerance, aggression and violence" in the attack on Zamudio.

On March 13 the Bolivian government declared three days of mourning for union and leftist leader Domitila Barrios de Chungara, who died of lung cancer at her home in Cochabamba earlier that day. Born into a mineworkers' family in 1937, Barrios de Chungara started her political work in a women's auxiliary for the mineworkers union in the Siglo XX mining district and eventually became a prominent union leader. In 1978 she initiated the mass hunger strike that resulted in the collapse of the 1971-1978 dictatorship of Col. Hugo Banzer Suárez and the restoration of formal democracy. (La Jornada, Mexico, March 14)

After an 18-day trial, a Guatemalan court has sentenced former general Pedro Pimentel to 6,030 years in prison for his participation in the Dec. 6, 1982 massacre of 201 civilians--most of them women and children--in the village of Dos Erres in the northern department of Petén. The sentence, 30 years for each of the victims plus 30 years for crimes against humanity, was made public the night of March 12.

LGBT groups in Mexico City were planning a march on March 18 from the Angel of Independence to Puebla state's office in the city to protest the March 10 murder of transgender activist Agnes Torres Sulca in Puebla city and to demand protection from homophobic hate crimes in the state. Puebla authorities claim the killers were a group of about five local youths; one of the youths, Luis Fernando Bueno, was arrested in Mérida in the eastern state of Yucután on March 16 and was said to have confessed. (Adital, Brazil, March 16; Milenio, Mexico, March 17)

Tens of thousands of Mexican teachers in several states went on strike or took to the streets March 14-16 in three days of "Action in Defense of Education." In addition to local demands, the actions were focused on opposition to a proposed "national evaluation" exam that the teachers consider a step towards privatizing public education, and rejection of the 23-year leadership of Elba Esther Gordillo Morales in the National Education Workers Union (SNTE), Latin America's largest teachers' union. The actions were called by the union's main rank-and-file caucus, the National Education Workers Coordinating Committee (CNTE), with the support of some state sections of the SNTE.

In the first student demonstration of Chile's new school year, some 5,000 youths marched in Santiago on March 15 in support of the student movement's demand last year: free, high-quality education. The Santiago authorities hadn't issued a permit for the action, and carabineros militarized police, including some on horseback, blocked the marchers at Bustamante Park. The police used tear gas and water cannons, and hooded protesters responded by hurling sticks, rocks and bottles. Traffic was blocked with barricades in some parts of the city, and a bus was set on fire. By evening, 105 people were detained and three agents were injured, according to the authorities.