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A Voice For the Voiceless

The Advocacy Project helps marginalized communities to tell their story, claim their rights and produce social change. We recruit graduate students to volunteer as Peace Fellows with partners.

The Impact of Service "Speaking with locals and living in a country is the best way to learn about the real lives of citizens, not just the stories in the mainstream media. I will be more critical of what I read as a result of this experience. I also feel even more grateful for my education, and I feel a stronger responsibility to assist others who do not have resources or access to opportunities in their communities." Maria Skouras (New York University) volunteered in 2011 as a Peace Fellow for eHomemakers in Malaysia. For more 2011 feedback click here.

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Partner Campaigns > Advocacy Quilting > Rio Negro Memoria... > The Memorial Quilt > Victims > Isabel Osorio

Isabel Osorio

Isabel was at home with her younger children making breakfast on the morning of March 13th, 1982, when the Civil Defense Patrol (PAC) from Xococ arrived. Her husband, Juan Chen, was hidden in the mountains following the massacres at Xococ that had taken place a month earlier. Her oldest daughter’s children were with her as well while their parents shopped in a nearby town.

She was aware of the danger when the Xococ soldiers called her to a meeting at the conacasta tree with the other women of Río Negro. Trying to do whatever she could to save lives, Isabel took her two small grandchildren and hid them in a ravine away from the house. She then went to meet the PAC patrols with her own children and marched to Pak’oxom with the others.

Isabel died at Pak’oxom with her three-year-old. Two older children escaped into the mountains and two others were taken by PAC members to the village of Xococ, where they lived for nearly two years as child slaves.  The day following the massacre, March 14th, 1982, Isabel’s son-in-law found his two children safe in the ravine, crying from having slept alone in the mountains. Both of Isabel’s grandchildren survived and live in the resettlement village of Pacux today.

In the years that followed the massacre, Isabel’s husband, Don Juan Chen, fought through the courts to have their children and the other sixteen children from Río Negro released from their slavery in Xococ. Don Juan won the release of his children and lives with his family in Pacux today. 

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