United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Annual report on the Human Rights Situation in Honduras
March 20, 2018
In the present report, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights describes the situation of human rights in Honduras from 1 January to 31 December 2017, with a focus on economic and social rights, notably land and labour rights, security, access to justice, the fight against impunity, democratic space and the situation of human rights defenders, journalists, indigenous peoples and women. The report also highlights some of the activities of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Honduras and concludes with recommendations.
New York Times Editorial Board
"Deadly Corruption in Honduras"
March 13, 2018
The killings might have succeeded in crushing indigenous opposition to a proposed dam in Honduras if Berta Cáceres had not been one of the victims. Her leadership of a campaign against the construction of the dam, on the Gualcarque River, which is sacred to her Lenca people, garnered a prestigious international award and international attention, and her murder by gunmen two years ago generated intense pressure to find her killers.
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Human Rights Violations in the Context of the 2017 Elections in Honduras
March 12, 2018
The general elections in Honduras took place on 26 November 2017. In the run-up to the polling day, large sectors of the population questioned the credibility of the electoral system and process. The lifting by the Supreme Court of the constitutional clause limiting the number of presidential mandates to one, and the ensuing candidacy of President Hernández to a second
term also triggered discontentment.
Prolonged delays and perceived irregularities in the counting of the votes for the presidential election led to claims of fraud and, starting from 29 November 2017, ignited a wave of protests across the country, in which the Military and the National Police performed public security tasks. On 1 December 2017, on the grounds that violence and looting had occurred, the President declared a state of emergency, establishing a curfew for a period of 10 days.
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Religious Leaders
Report from the Emergency Delegation of Religious Leaders to Honduras
February 22, 2018
On January 24th, 2018 fifty faith and civic leaders from the United States, Canada, Colombia, and Argentina embarked on a six-day Emergency Religious Delegation to Honduras in the aftermath of a contested presidential election and reports of state-sponsored human rights violations against the Honduran people. Eight religious denominations were represented by the 40+ faith groups and human rights organizations that sent delegates from 13 states in the U.S. The group traveled to Honduras in response to an invitation from Jesuit Father Ismael “Melo” Moreno, director of Radio Progreso and ERIC (Equipo de Reflexión, Investigación y Comunicación), and other faith groups in Honduras who accompany impoverished and marginalized people.
COFADEH
Human Rights Violations in the Context of Honduran Anti-Fraud Protests
February 5, 2018
The Committee of Family Members of the Detained and Disappeared in Honduras (COFADEH) releases before the national and international community its second report about the human rights context in the midst of the anti-fraud protests in Honduras in 2017.
The document focuses attention on the human rights violations related to to public protests against electoral fraud and selective attacks against the political opposition. The facts backing this report were obtained through monitoring of the repression in different areas of the country, contacts with social leaders, local human rights defenders, networks of advocates, victims and witnesses, webpages of human rights organizations, interviews with different actors using a variety of internet technologies, witness testimony taken in our offices, visits to morgues and hospitals and, to a lessor extent, through media monitoring.
The report contains information from around the country and covers the period between November 26th and December 31st, 2017.
Human Rights Watch
Honduras, World Report 2018
Violent crime is rampant in Honduras. Despite a downward trend in recent years, the murder rate remains among the highest in the world. Journalists, environmental activists, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals are among those most vulnerable to violence. Efforts to reform the institutions responsible for providing public security have made little progress. Marred by corruption and abuse, the judiciary and police remain largely ineffective. Impunity for crime and human rights abuses is the norm.
InSight Crime
Report Highlights Need for Independent Anti-Graft Body in Honduras
February 23, 2018
A new report says that an anti-graft body in Honduras has secured prosecutions in only a small fraction of the cases it has investigated in recent years, illustrating the weakness of Honduran institutions when it comes to anti-corruption measures.
Honduras’ National Anti-Corruption Council (Consejo Nacional Anticorrupción – CNA) initiated a total of 67 investigations into corruption between 2014 and 2017 but secured prosecutions in just 10 of them, according to a February 22 report from the organization.
Washington Post Editorial Board
"Honduras’s president suspiciously reversed a loss. Then the U.S. congratulated him"
January 14, 2018
AS IN much of the rest of the world, democracy is on the defensive in Latin America, in part because it has few principled defenders. A simple comparison of two ongoing political crises, in Venezuela and Honduras, illustrates the problem. After Venezuela’s populist anti-American government rigged state gubernatorial elections in October, the United States led a campaign of condemnation and stepped up sanctions. But when Honduras’s rightist pro-American president suspiciously reversed what looked like an upset loss in a presidential election a month later, theTrump administration congratulated him.
Global Witness
Honduras: The Deadliest Country in the World for Environmental Activism
January 31, 2017
Nowhere are you more likely to be killed for standing up to companies that grab land and trash the environment than in Honduras.
More than 120 people have died since 2010, according to Global Witness research. The victims were ordinary people who took a stand against dams, mines, logging or agriculture on their land –murdered by state forces, security guards or hired assassins. Countless others have been threatened, attacked or imprisoned.
Organization of American States
Report by Irfan Nooruddin (Georgetown University)
December 17, 2017
Honduras held a national election on 26 November 2017. The main presidential candidates represented the Partido Nacional de Honduras (National Party, or NP) and the Alianza de Oposición en Contra de la Dictadura (Opposition Alliance, or Alianza). Polls closed at 1600 hrs local time. The next day the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) state that the Alianza was ahead by five percentage points with approximately 57 percent of the vote counted. A few days later updated results were posted showing the incumbent NP candidate in the lead. This change in fortunes and the opacity of the counting process has led to allegations of fraud by the opposition that has refused to accept the results.
Whether there existed electoral irregularities that affected the outcome is beyond the scope of this report. Rather the analysis of electoral data provided by the TSE can shed light mainly on whether the reversal of fortune experienced by the opposition alliance is plausible given the reported data. The report also assesses the plausibility of claims by the incumbent that the early lead of the opposition was an artifact of the fact that opposition strongholds reported their results to the TSE first causing a misleading impression of an irreversible advantage.
Amnesty International
"Government Deploys Dangerous and Illegal Tactics to Silence Population"
December 8, 2017
The Honduran government is deploying dangerous and illegal tactics to silence any dissenting voices in the aftermath of one of the country’s worst political crisis in a decade, including preventing lawyers and human rights activists from visiting detained demonstrators, Amnesty International said after a visit to the country following contested presidential elections on 26 November.
“Honduras seems to be on a very dangerous free fall where ordinary people are the victims of reckless and selfish political games,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International.
GAIPE
Dam Violence: The Plan that Killed Berta Caceras
November 2017
On March 2, 2016, armed men murdered human rights defender Berta Isabel Cáceres Flores, and shot Mexican environmental activist Gustavo Castro Soto in the town of La Esperanza, Department of Intibucá, Honduras. Their relatives and the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) immediately requested an independent investigation due to concerns that Honduran authorities would not identify the intellectual authors of the crime.
The relatives of Berta Cáceres and COPINH made this request before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), the United Nations and many other national and international actors. Nevertheless, they were disregarded by the Honduran State.
Amnesty International
"We Are Defending the Land With Our Blood"
September 1, 2016
Amnesty International’s research confirms the high level of violence against human rights defenders who work to protect and promote the rights to territory, the environment and those linked to access to land which exists in Honduras. The 2009 coup intensified the atmosphere of hostility towards human right defenders in the country. Most of the communities and movements interviewed by Amnesty International in Honduras included people who had been granted precautionary measures by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). ‘Precautionary measures’ refers to a protection mechanism for serious and urgent situations creating a risk of irreparable harm to a person or a group of people. Several of these people have continued to be threatened and attacked over the years; some have even been killed. Such was the case of the defender of Indigenous Peoples and the environment Berta Cáceres, General Coordinator of the National Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (Coordinadora General del Consejo Cívico de Organizaciones Populares e Indígenas de Honduras, COPINH), who was assassinated on 2 March 2016.
Amnesty International’s research shows that the Honduran authorities have failed to implement effective protection measures for defenders. The state has also failed to create suitable communication channels so that those for whom precautionary measures have been ordered can propose means of protection appropriate for the structure of their organization and for the context in which they carry out their rural and community work, as well as meeting their specific protection needs.