Honduras: News & Updates

Zones of Economic Development and Employment (ZEDEs) in Honduras are an extreme form of neoliberalism. Recently ZEDE Próspera announced it will seek consultations under CAFTA for lost investments after the Honduran Congress overturned the ZEDE law earlier this year. This interview with Fernando García, the Honduran Presidential Commissioner Against ZEDEs gives some context and refers to ZEDE Próspera’s recent announcements. 

A petition for a criminal probe against the Dutch state-run development bank FMO has been filed in the Netherlands for alleged complicity in bloodshed in Honduras. FMO, the acronym for the Netherlands Development Finance Company, had been involved in financing the controversial Agua Zarca dam project in northwest Honduras from 2014 to 2017. The project, slated for construction in Indigenous Lenca territory, drew international scrutiny after several murders surrounding the project, including the 2016 assassination of world-renowned Indigenous water defender Berta Cáceres. Cáceres had led the resistance to the dam, which many Indigenous people said would displace them from the Gualcarque river, regarded as sacred. She was later killed by a hit squad whose members had connections to both the Honduran military as well as DESA, the dam-building company receiving loan money from FMO. “For the Lenca people this new legal action is the opportunity to reveal the criminal activity inherent to the financing of the Agua Zarca,” Berta's daughter Bertha Zúñiga Cáceres told Al Jazeera. It is also a way, she said, “to know that my mother wasn’t mistaken in establishing that these businesses and these banks are criminals”.

More than 900 construction workers in Honduras building a new U.S. embassy went on strike on Wednesday and Thursday to demand fair treatment. The workers in Honduras say they were forced to sign illegal labor contracts that do not protect them from work injuries, according to HCH. The workers are also asking for permanent contracts. Some were made to sign hourly contracts, which is also illegal, according to Radio America. 

The Attorney General's Office of the Republic of Honduras (PGR), announced its victory in the lawsuit filed by at least 100 investors who sustained an allegation for alleged expropriations in which they claim to have lost millions of dollars, which was dismissed by the U.S. Court of Appeals of the 11th Circuit of Florida. This U.S. Court issued a judgment in favor of the State of Honduras that includes the Instituto de la Propiedad (IP) and the Empresa Nacional de Energía Eléctrica (ENEE), in the case Agurcia v. Republic of Honduras, filed in the Middle Federal District of Florida, according to the PGR in a written statement.  

Perched on an incline where the road splits the countryside as much as the community, Webster’s home on the island of Roatán is at the center of a battle over land rights and sovereignty that has galvanized Honduras. It’s also symptomatic of a broader phenomenon throughout the region, where foreigners – often cryptocurrency enthusiasts, libertarians or both – have flocked in recent years, supporting controversial projects – such as the proposed “Bitcoin City” in El Salvador – threatening to displace local residents and drawing comparisons to colonialists. When the new Honduran government repealed a pair of laws in late April that had allowed for the creation of semi-autonomous zones called a Zede, it sent a similar message. But investors in the Zede on Roatán, known as Honduras Próspera, have challenged the move.

Honduras commemorated the 13th anniversary of the coup d’état this month, for many the first time since the coup this took place under a legitimate government. While some important steps have been made to improve the situation, for example strengthening UFERCO which started an investigation into the ZEDEs, the legacy of the last 12 years still loom heavily over Honduras. Two more members of the LGBTQ+ community were murdered in June. The militarization of Honduras continues as the Xiomara administration failed to to disband the Military Police. They even started talks with Southcom to strengthen the Honduran Armed Forces. On a more positive note, David Castillo was finally sentenced for his role in the murder of Berta Cáceres and the Guapinol defenders had the charges officially dropped against them. Welcome to another month in Honduras.

 The development promised by Minerales de Occidente S.A. (Minosa) in La Unión, Copán, has cost the inhabitants of Azacualpa the destruction of the historic Maya-Chortí cemetery of San Andrés, despite the fact that two high courts of Honduras have ruled to protect it. Minosa, a subsidiary in Honduras of the transnational Aura Minerals, imposed its project against the will of the Maya-Chortí people of Azacualpa, while at the same time promoting campaigns on social networks about the supposed economic development that mining produces for the communities. However, for the member of the Asociación de Organismos No Gubernamentales (Asonog), José Ramón Ávila, this development promoted by mining is not reflected in the municipality of La Unión. In fact, he believes that a socioeconomic study would find the same or greater poverty than in any other municipality.

"The government of Honduras should adopt reforms that provide greater protection for fundamental rights and the rule of law after years of setbacks since the 2009 coup", Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to President Xiomara Castro. The letter is accompanied by a 14-page report outlining the main human rights challenges in Honduras, as well as a series of key recommendations to address them. The main issues Human Rights Watch addresses in the report are the independence of the judiciary and the Public Ministry, the fight against corruption, the rights of women and girls, the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, the independent work of civil society and journalists, the land rights of communities, and migration and internal displacement.

by Francesca Volpi

Thousands of women and young girls living in poverty are forced to turn to a deadly illegal trade – risking jail and their lives

It is a secret that spreads by word of mouth in poor neighbourhoods across Honduras; where to buy the pills, how to use them without being discovered, what to say if you have to go to the hospital. Blunt objects, herbal infusions, plant medicine all become tools of a deadly trade in illegal abortions when no other option exists.

On behalf of IRTF's Rapid Response Network (RRN) members, we wrote six letters this month to heads of state and other high-level officials in Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico, urging their swift action in response to human rights abuses occurring in their countries.  We join with civil society groups in Latin America to: (1) protect people living under threat, (2) demand investigations into human rights crimes, (3) bring human rights criminals to justice.

IRTF’s Rapid Response Network (RRN) volunteers write six letters in response to urgent human rights cases each month. We send copies of these letters to US ambassadors, embassy human rights officers, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, regional representatives of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and desk officers at the US State Department. To read the letters, see https://www.irtfcleveland.org/content/rrn , or ask us to mail you hard copies.