US Senator Joins Call for Honduras to Investigate Berta Caceres

[Judi Lynn]

US Senator Joins Call for Honduras to Investigate Berta Caceres
Published 3 June 2016 (13 hours 40 minutes ago)


Three months since Honduran leader Berta Caceres was shot dead, demands for an independent investigation into the crime remain unanswered.


Pressure on the Honduran government to get to the bottom of the murder of renowned Indigenous leader Berta Caceres continues from many sides as U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy echoed the family’s calls on Thursday for an independent, internationally-led investigation into the high-profile assassination.

Leahy also urged the Honduran authorities to cooperate with the anti-corruption body launched earlier this year with the backing of the government and the Organization of American States.

The Support Mission Against Corruption and Impunity, better known as Maccih, kicked off in January after widespread high-level government corruption implicating the ruling National Party came to the fore last year, sparking months of protests.

The Honduran Government has sought to limit Maccih’s mandate from the beginning, but the Honduran people have made clear that they are fed up with the corruption and impunity that have been tolerated and even encouraged by elites in that society for generations,” Leahy said in a statement Thursday.

More:
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/US-Senator-Joins-Call-for-Honduras-to-Investigate-Berta-Caceres-20160603-0004.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. Berta Caceres' Movement Warns of New Death Squads in Honduras

Berta Caceres' Movement Warns of New Death Squads in Honduras
Published 2 June 2016


Honduras has again become a killing field for land rights activists and human rights defenders, akin to the Cold War paramilitary era of the 1980s.


Members of the Indigenous movement of murdered Honduran environmental leader Berta Caceres have warned that there are death squads operating in the territories that the slain activist long fought to defend that are akin to the brutal Cold War-era and CIA-trained secret army unit in Honduras known as Battalion 316.

“We believe that what was the 316 in the 1980s has moved into our territories,” Tomas Gomez, leader of the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Movements of Honduras, or COPINH, told the publication Pasos de Animal Grande on Monday. He added that that the apparent death squads operate with a hit list that was formerly topped by Berta Caceres in the years leading up to her murder.

Gomez recently told teleSUR that the harassment and threats against COPINH and the Lenca community in Rio Blanco, the site of the contested Agua Zarca dam that Caceres resisted, have increased since she was assassinated on March 3.

“We believe that what was the 316 in the 1980s has moved into our territories,” Tomas Gomez, leader of the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Movements of Honduras, or COPINH, told the publication Pasos de Animal Grande on Monday. He added that that the apparent death squads operate with a hit list that was formerly topped by Berta Caceres in the years leading up to her murder.

Gomez recently told teleSUR that the harassment and threats against COPINH and the Lenca community in Rio Blanco, the site of the contested Agua Zarca dam that Caceres resisted, have increased since she was assassinated on March 3.

More:
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Berta-Caceres-Movement-Warns-of-New-Death-Squads-in-Honduras-20160602-0003.html

[Ghost Dog]

2. Has Ms. Clinton had anything yet to say about this?

The Nation. MARCH 10, 2016

Before Her Murder, Berta Cáceres Singled Out Hillary Clinton for Criticism

The presidential candidate has ignored criticism of her role in enabling the consolidation of the Honduran coup...

http://www.thenation.com/article/chronicle-of-a-honduran-assassination-foretold/

Oh, Telesur, some will say. I'll never read anything from such an unamerican source...

[MisterP]

3. she said it was legal after the ambassador proved it wasn't

he even warned her days before something was going down
https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09TEGUCIGALPA489_a.html

[Ghost Dog]

4. Thanks. Interesting list of addressees there...

... But I meant, has she had anything to say specifically about the Berta Isabel Cáceres Flores murder?

[MisterP]

5. these forces were unleashed by the coup she greenlit and hugely funded by her 2009-13

when asked about Caceres Clinton's response was basically "I kicked out Zelaya and Micheletti and that was 7 years ago: why's everyone bothering me with this nonevent?!"
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/transcript-hillary-clinton-meets-news-editorial-board-article-1.2596292

[Ghost Dog]

6. Thanks.

[Zorro]

8. And here's how she really responded

Clinton: Well, let me again try to put this in context. The legislature, the national legislature in Honduras and the national judiciary actually followed the law in removing President Zelaya. Now I didn't like the way it looked or the way they did it but they had a very strong argument that they had followed the constitution and the legal precedence. And as you know, they really undercut their argument by spiriting him out of the country in his pajamas, where they sent the military to take him out of his bed and get him out of the country. So this began as a very mixed and difficult situation.

If the United States government declares a coup, you immediately have to shut off all aid including humanitarian aid, the Agency for International Development aid, the support that we were providing at that time for a lot of very poor people, and that triggers a legal necessity. There's no way to get around it. So our assessment was, we will just make the situation worse by punishing the Honduran people if we declare a coup and we immediately have to stop all aid for the people, but we should slow walk and try to stop anything that the government could take advantage of without calling it a coup.

So you're right. I worked very hard with leaders in the region and got Oscar Arias, the Nobel Prize winner, to take the lead on trying to broker a resolution. Without bloodshed. And that was very important to us that… Zelaya had friends and allies not just in Honduras but in some of the neighboring countries like Nicaragua, and that we could have had a terrible civil war that would have been just terrifying in its loss of life.

So I think we came out with a solution that did hold new elections, but it did not in any way address the structural, systemic problems in that society. And I share your concern that it's not just government actions. Drug gangs, traffickers of all kinds are preying on the people of Honduras.

So I think we need to do more of a Colombian plan for Central America, because remember what was going in Colombia when first my husband and then followed by President Bush had Plan Colombia, which was to try to use our leverage to rein in the government in their actions against the FARC and the guerillas, but also to help the government stop the advance of the FARC and guerillas.

And now we're in the middle of peace talks. It didn't happen overnight. It took a number of years, but I want to see a much more comprehensive approach towards Central America because it's just Honduras. The highest murder rate is in El Salvador and we've got Guatemala with all the problems you know so well.

So I think in retrospect we managed a very difficult situation without bloodshed, without a civil war that led to a new election, and I think that was better for the Honduran people, but we have a lot of work to do to try to help stabilize that and deal with corruption, deal with violence and the gangs and so much else.

[Octafish]

7. 22 journalists have died since the coup in Honduras since 2014

From the great DUer Judi Lynn:

Journalists demand justice for 22 colleagues murdered in Honduras

Press freedom campaigners say 91% of the murderers enjoy impunity

Roy Greenslade
The Guardian, Tuesday 12 April 2016 05.53 EDT

Journalists and defenders of free expression gathered in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, on Monday to demand justice for the 22 journalists who have been murdered in the country since 2014.

. . .

The demonstrators placed coffins at the entrance to the office in memory of the 22 journalists killed during the lifetime of the current government, headed by President Juan Orlando Hernandez.

In those cases, 91% of the murderers continue to enjoy impunity, said C-Libre director and former prosecutor Edy Tabora.

The committee has called for the creation of a specialised unit to investigate “aggression against freedom of expression.” Tabora said there had been 218 attacks against journalists in Honduras in 2015.

CONTINUED...

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2016/apr/12/journalists-demand-justice-for-22-colleagues-murdered-in-honduras

Don't know about others on DU, but for me: Democracy must mean more than making money.

[think]

9. K&R.