NOTE: This is Honduras Now’s attempt to fill the shoes of Daniel Langmeier, who provided us all with amazing and consistent daily reports on Honduran news for 10 years via email. It is impossible to fill his shoes, but this is our attempt to provide monthly summaries of what is going on in Honduras. Thank you so much, Daniel, for your commitment and dedication.
All errors are mine and apologies for the typos. This is not a complete list of news, just the issues that stood out (to me). Please send any comments, updates, or news to: karen@hondurasnow.org and I will try and include missing details/issues next month. New updates will be posted on the second week of the month.
Honduran News
Hondurans hit the beaches and rivers and/or went home to visit family in rural areas during Easter week (Semana Santa) held from last Wednesday, April 5th until yesterday (Sunday).
https://tiempo.hn/50-alfombras-adornaran-comayagua-en-semana-santa/
PRISONS
In response to several prisoner uprisings on April 9th in at least four Honduran prisons, including the two maximum-security prisons, President Xiomara announced that the government will intervene in the prison system. Yesterday, at least one person was killed and eleven people were injured according to the High Commissioner on Human Rights in Honduras (OACNUDH). In response, CONAPREV (the Honduran government institution responsible for overseeing detention conditions in the country) insists that the government should not militarize the prisons; should ‘clean up’ the authorities in charge of managing the prisons, insist that convicted prisoners be separated from individuals in pre-trial detention, and warns that Honduran prisons are overpopulated. Foreign Affairs Minister Enrique Reina recognizes that the prisons suffer from a structural problem that has been unresolved for years and assures that international human rights standards will be respected.
President Xiomara’s Twitter announcement
UN High Commissioner’s statement
https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=235827202303693&set=pcb.235827392303674
LAND DEFENDERS
OFRANEH raises alarm at unknown individuals firing weapons close to the land recovery Wagaira Le in Roatán in the community of Punta Gorda. Trumped up charges against six community leaders, including OFRANEH representative Melissa Martínez, are still pending the next court date.
The Association for the Development of the Peninsula of Zacate Grande (ADEPZA) warns of on-going criminalization and threats against communities in southern Honduras. On March 27th, Santos H. Ortiz was arrested by Honduran police for unknown reasons. Then, when his spouse, María Concepción Hernández went to visit him in jail on April 1st, she was arrested allegedly because of a pending arrest warrant dating back to August 29, 2019. Their young son of 12 years old, who accompanied his mother to the police station, was forced to travel alone back to their home. The police refused to provide any information about their detention to their lawyers. Santos and María have been criminalized on multiple occasions for protecting their land and the privatization of public beaches on the peninsula of Zacate Grande in the community of Playa Blanca. ADEPZA holds the large land owner Jorge Luis Cassis Leiva and municipal authorities including mayor Alberto Cruz, Roman Sierra and Nelson Flores for any violence committed against the Zacate Grande communities.
CNTC issues statements about the criminalization of campesinos and evictions. Women campesinas from Las Galileas were violently evicted by Honduran police and one woman, Nolvia Albertina Obanda Turcios was arrested.
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=2153928971482835&set=pcb.2153929271482805
COPINH
The trial against 6 former public officials accused in the Fraud on the Gualcarque case finished on March 23. The verdict has not been announced as the Sentencing court must wait for a pending decision from the Constitutional chamber about an injunction (amparo) presented by David Castillo’s defense. In the meantime, COPINH provides an overview of the evidence against them, nothing that the Atala Zablah family has still not been accused or investigated for their role in this case (or Berta’s murder). COPINH lays out the five pieces of evidence presented in the Fraud on the Gualcarque case:
- Witness Jacobo Atlala Zablah, the owner of DESA, admitted that David Castillo had worked with the National Electrical Energy Company (ENEE) and that “had weight.” And Castillo had USED other people as associates.
- As the general manager of DESA owned by the Atala Zablah, David Castillo continued to receive a salary as an assistant to ENEE management. Between 2011 and 2012, he received $42,000 USD as a public employee until he left the position.
- Raul Pineda Pineda, the mayor of San Francisco de Ojuera (where DESA moved the dam construction to after opposition in Rio Blanco), falsified public documents affirming that a community consultation had occurred, when it had not.
- Witness Roberto Pacheco Reyes, DESA’s notary, expressed that David Castillo had created the company PEMSA in Panama for the convenience of the country/jurisdiction being a fiscal paradise.
- David Castillo appeared as a DESA representative in a meeting in July 2011 in the process for the environmental license, at the same time he was the managing assistant to Roberto Martínez Lozano of the ENEE.
COPINH held an International Forum in Tegucigalpa called ‘Popular Energy Alternatives’. This month was the 30th anniversary of COPINH’s founding, and the 10-year anniversary of the struggle and resistance in Rio Blanco, beginning with the road blockade at ‘El Roble’ preventing DESA from accessing the river. COPINH took the opportunity to demand that DESA’s dam concession on the Gualcarque river be suspended.
GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES: A NEW LAW & ESTABLISHING TIES WITH CHINA
President Xiomara’s administration via the National Congress is proposing the “Tax Justice Law” which seeks to eliminate tax breaks for a wealthy handful of companies that have benefited greatly since the 2009 coup. The Law is strongly and unsurprisingly opposed by the business sector (and all the wealthy folks that have benefited from it).
https://cespad.org.hn/analisis-semanal-la-ley-de-justicia-tributaria-una-necesidad-historica/
On March 14, the Xiomara administration announces that Honduras will establish formal ties with China. The Ambassador of Taiwan in Honduras left the country shortly after, while Foreign Minister Enrique Reina visited China to discuss the new relationship.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/25/asia/honduras-cuts-diplomatic-ties-with-taiwan-intl-hnk/index.html
HUMAN RIGHTS REPORTS
On March 28th, the UN High Commissioner’s Office on Human Rights published their annual report about the human rights situation in Honduras in 2022:
Live Facebook event recorded here
Report (unofficial English translation) here: https://reliefweb.int/report/honduras/situation-human-rights-honduras-report-united-nations-high-commissioner-human-rights-ahrc5224-unofficial-english-translation
Country visit by the U.N. Working Group on Forced Disappearances. The Group visited the Garifuna community of Triunfo de la Cruz and spoke with organizations, such as Cofadeh in Tegucigalpa. Ofraneh continues to insist that the Public Prosecutor’s office include the SUNLA in the investigations surrounding the disappearance of the four Garifuna leaders from Triunfo de la Cruz.
AGUAN VALLEY
The Agrarian Platform reports that another campesino was assassinated in the Aguán and others have been subject to defamation on social media. Emerson Martínes (22 years old) was murdered on March 25 at 12:40 one block from his house in Los Laureles. He was attacked by armed men and shot at around 14 times. Emerson was a member of the Los Laureles cooperative fighting for their land stolen by Dinant Corporation. Emerson’s family has reported in the last few months of being monitored by unknown men including by drones. He is the second member of Los Laureles cooperative murdered over the last four months, and the eight defenders murdered in the region this year.
https://www.facebook.com/PlataformaAgrariaHn/photos/pcb.6165257466865532/6165257353532210
The Agrarian Platform also reported that an “irregular armed group” attempted to evict campesinos of the Cooperative La Occidental, while the campesino group Auxiliadora remains under threat by a similar armed group working on behalf of ex-Congress representative (and known drug trafficker), Oscar Nájera.
The Law Firm for Studies for Dignity in support of the campesinos from the Aguán Valley reports that campesino Jeremías Cruz was freed from pre-trial detention on March 31st. Jeremías is accused, like so many campesinos in Honduras, of usurpation or illegal possession of land. His trial is scheduled for April 17, 2023 in Trujillo.
The Coalition Against Impunity (a coalition of various organizations in Honduras) visited the Aguán Valley region and published a communique expressing concern of the land dispossession, violence, and failure of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, National Protection Mechanism, and the state in protecting the lives of land defenders and investigating the land and human rights issues.
Recording of the live report back here: https://www.facebook.com/HnCCI/videos/773738144274493
SECURITY
President Xiomara announces the second stage of the ‘National Security Plan’ and extends the partial state of exception despite concerns expressed by human rights groups.
Human rights lawyer Joaquin Mejía analyzes the record reduction of homicides in Honduras from 41.70 (2021) to 35.79 (2022) for every 100,000 inhabitants, the lowest the rate has been in the last ten years.
MIGRANTS
On March 28th, a fire broke out in a migrant detention center in Cuidad Juárez, Mexico close to the U.S. border. Originally, there were reports of over 60 individuals were killed or injured Contracorriente reports on the confusion around the reporting by both the Mexican and Honduran authorities. Six Hondurans died in the fire.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/28/deadly-fire-migrant-facility-mexico-ciudad-juarez
WORKERS’ RIGHTS & LABOR LAWS
Seasonal farm (melon) workers mobilize against labor conditions & bad faith of Fyffes. Workers have been working for 5 to 20 years on Fyffes plantations do not have job security, no social security benefits, overtime, pay for the 13th and 14th months (as Honduran labor law requires). The workers demand that Fyffes negotiate a fair contract. The action is led in Honduras by the independent farmworker union (Sindicato de Trabajadores de la Agroindustria y Similares (STAS)) and supported by the Global Labor Justice- International Labor Rights Forum (GLJ-ILRF)
The Honduran Women’s Collective (CODEMUH) together with Congressional representatives, presents the ‘Law for Health in the Workplace.’ The law promotes the recognition of work-related illnesses and disabilities that are not recognized by the current Labor Code, among other proposals.
https://www.latribuna.hn/2023/03/08/presentan-en-el-cn-anteproyecto-de-ley-de-salud-en-el-trabajo/
Labor and social movement leader, Carlos H. Reyes and Honduran labor Federations, denounce the efforts by the Liberal Party to push through a labor law called the ‘Part-time Employment Law.’ According to Reyes, the law is a new version of the Temporal Labor Law that was overturned last year by Congress, and amounts to promoting the same labor violations contained in the overturned law. The law would require reforms to the current Labor Code. According to the Honduran Women’s Collective, only the business class would benefit from such law.
https://criterio.hn/centrales-obreras-afirman-que-no-permitiran-reformas-al-codigo-del-trabajo/
https://criterio.hn/liberales-plantean-y-exigen-se-apruebe-ley-de-empleo-a-tiempo-parcial/
CORRUPTION AND DRUG TRIALS
CESPAD raises concern about the ongoing delays surrounding the installation of the CICIH in the country three months after a memorandum of understanding was signed between the Government of Honduras and the UN.
NY prosecutors submit their arguments as to why Judge Castel should not separate ex-President Juan Orlando Hernández’s case from two accused co-conspirators, Juan Carlos “El Tigre” Bonilla and Mauricio Hernández. So far, all three are set to be tried together. Meanwhile, prosecutors asked for a 60-day extension in providing JOH’s defense with classified documents. The judge partially grants an extension until May 17th but notes that beyond that date, such additional requests will require the judge to change the trial date currently scheduled for September 18th, 2023.
In other drug cases, José Inocente Valle Valle completed his 10-year prison sentence and was deported to Honduras at the end of March. He does not face any charges in Honduras. Drug trafficker, a family member of Los Cachiros, and former Congressional representative Midence Oqueli was extradited to face drug trafficking charges in the U.S. Drug trafficker Herlinda Bobadilla was sentenced to 20 years in prison on March 28, 2023.