Although accurate numbers are notoriously difficult to come by, Honduras has possibly the highest murder rate in the world.
The violence is political (from all sides), criminal (of the random and organized variety), urban and rural. As Mexican drug cartels expand their presence in Central America, Sinaloa Cartel boss Chapo Guzman has reportedly taken to 'resting' in Western Honduras.
Karol Cabrera is a Honduran journalist and relentless defender of the coup that ousted former President Mel Zelaya. Last year hit men on a motorcycle murdered her 16-year-old daughter who at the time was eight months pregnant.
Two days ago hit men came after Cabrera herself but only managed to kill fellow journalist Joseph Ochoa. When asked who was behind the attacks, Cabrera blamed the Popular Resistance Front, a pro-Zelaya group that maintains they had nothing to do with the attack.
Unfortunately, violence from multiple sides and sectors are likely to continue to plague Honduras. And it will continue to be impossible to paint a black-or-white picture of heroes and villains of the ongoing social and political strife.
Online Sources: Mapsofworld.com, Latin American Herald Tribune, El Heraldo, Univision
Image Source: La Tribuna
6 comments:
Ironically, Mr. Ben, I think you are very juvenile and haven't gotten over your cold war mentality and black-and-white thinking.
Who the hell told you that crimes come "from all sides"? You are the only one saying so, not even Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, CIDH, or any organization with solid proof has ever dared to say something like that, but i guess it is only your "common sense" speaking. Well, you failed.
Things are not the way you want them to be because of your political ideology, they are the way they are because they are and it is a FALLACY to say that anti coup activists have murdered ANYONE who is pro coup. I think in my 8 months of nonstop research and being on top of news from MY COUNTRY, I have NEVER EVER read, seen or have any knowledge that any anti coup activist has murdered anyone, except from you. This is new to me!! wow, you're splendid! you taught me something new and I am on top of this 24/7 for over 8 months now! Genius!
Your ignorance on Latin America is very noticeable, even more your ignorance on Honduras, its history, and your blatant hypocrisy regarding human rights violations and political assassinations.
There have been THREE people murdered by security forces in the last month,all ANTI COUP ACTIVISTS but you only echo mainstream news reports on ONE pro coup person whose murder attempt is shown in a light, being aligned to the pro coup media agenda to mould a public opinion, as if it had been the resistance the ones who did it. This is only an attempt to neutralize public opinion and to criminalize anti coup activists, to show that both sides are "equally evil", which is a very old cold war, coup regime tactic called "two demons theory" or "dirty war". If you had the slightest knowledge in what you intend to inform, you would know this, but you don't.
Let me tell you something, BEN, the resistance is not a small group of people, a religious sect, it is a very BIG part of the population who hold an opinion and who have been REPRESSED by state terrorism, they have been silenced and there have been multiple attacks on the few media who offer them voice, a radio station was even BURNT. You can bet on the fact that La Tribuna is not one of those media outlets that have been attacked, since ex President and business magnate Flores Facussé, who is a strong supporter of the coup is its owner. They will never publish all sides of events taking place and never have, in fact they have dedicated themselves to demonize, criminalize, and justify repression against POOR people, who are UNARMED and have decided to protest in a peaceful, non-violent manner.
Until NOW, there has been not ONE proof that any citizen of the resistance has ever attempted against anyone who was pro coup. This Carol incident is just one in comparison to the multiple attacks on anti coup activists and there is no proof that it was any anti coup activist, which in their majority are very poor people who don't have military weapons like the ones the mercenaries used.
Her daughter's murderers were spotted by witnesses who were accompanying her inside the car and in spite of Micheletti accusing the resistance as well as Cabrera herself, the POLICE corrected them based on investigations finding out that it was a member of a football bar the one who murdered her, since she was involved in that and one of her friends had problems with them. It is very convenient that media hasn't reported on this to justify further repression and criminalization of people who only have an opinion, like I do and my family. I would appreciate that instead of suggesting things, you would inform yourself and have a bit of ethics when publishing news instead of commenting in a very immature way.
In the first place, Ms Cabrera is not really a journalist and everybody in my country knows this. She loves polemics and even during the radio program she was hosting in the moment she was attacked, she was criticizing in a very low and disrespectful way the current administration and its members. Ms. Cabrera is not a very liked person overall in the country, neither by coup supporters nor by anti coup activists and it is known that she has many many enemies, even if she is blaming people like my family of the murder of this innocent man.
Secondly, the father of the murdered journalist stated that she was the one who asked her bodyguard(A POLICEMAN) to get out of the car int he middle of the way heading to her home, and Joseph was murdered minutes after this happened.
Believe it or not, people who are against the coup don't intend to be considered saintly by anyone who calls him or herself "neutral" and "nonpartisan". Most of them are not even political fundamentalists nor idolize Zelaya, because in the first place these people don't call themselves "Zelayistas", they are simply a vast front against the coup d'etat not called A ZELAYA FRONT, but a RESISTANCE FRONT to the state sponsored terror against the population, in the search of justice and in the struggle to create new laws to protect the poorest and most hard-working people, who are excluded from them.
It is not the same to sponsor state terrorism murdering people, supressing freedom of speach and to intend to prove that the ones being affected by this are criminals or mercenaries "equally bad". The peoples in resistance are not stupid and don't want to cause things that will just go on justifying the recent murders from state
No one is guilty unless proven otherwise, this is modern law, medieval law is accussations based on political agendas without any solid evidence.
Zelaya is now ex President, out of the country, so get over it. There is no excuse now to continue demonizing our peoples and to continue moulding public opinion as if they are criminals too, hence they deserve repression too. My family are resistance and if you think you have the right to say that this population are inciting to violence, please do my people a favour and stop posting nonsense. The mainstream media is doing all the diffaming work.
According to Ben's logic, there were no villains in the Pinochet regime. The ones protesting against it were equally villains.
Grow up, kid.
Per your post, I went back and read the OCAVI figures going back to the year 2000.
To my surprise (and shock, I confess), Honduras has been up with (or ahead of, El Salvador and Colombia, going back eight or nine years. I can only assume that this is due to a combo of Honduras' chronic and endemic poverty, and mara-related influence, with the latter phenomenon appearing the 1990's, out of El Sal.
Another surprising aspect of the growing violence trend in Honduras is that I don't recall any of the media (Honduran OR international) having picked up on the Honduran homicide angle; most of the focus is on the violence in El Sal and Colombia, as I say.
...Which goes to the questions, 1) how widely recognized and appreciated is the problem within Honduras, and 2) what does the Lobo government proposed to do about it?
Tambopaxi - my best guess as to why this is not reported on is that it doesn't fit a narrative that media types are familiar with. With El Salvador and Colombia, mainstream outlets that don't have many (or any) people with regional knowledge can still talk about lingering civil strife/insurgencies/drug-related violence etc as the source of wide-scale violence.
It will be interesting to see if this story gets picked up since last year's coup brought Honduras into the mainstream media.
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