For residents of El Salvador’s northern department of Cabañas, 2009 was ayear fraught with political high drama that reached a tragic climax inDecember with the assassination of two anti-mining activists. A publiccommemoration of their work, which marked the start of 2010, was asmuch a statement of solidarity as one of mourning. On December 20, heavily armed gunmen evaded police protection andmurdered the vice president of an anti-mining environmentalorganization, Ramiro Rivera Gómez. Six days later, Dora “Alicia”Recinos Sorto, a prominent member of the same organization, was shotand killed while returning home after washing clothes in a nearbystream. She was pregnant and carrying her two-year-old son when she waskilled.