Congressional Travel to Honduras Used to Support US Lawmaker's Business Interests

[Downwinder]

http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebook/erin-rosa/2010/12/congressional-travel-honduras-used-support-us-lawmakers-business-interest

[Peace Patriot]

1. I gotto quote this. It's just so unbelievably disgusting...

...while anti-coup protestors where getting beheaded, shot (including a teacher shot in front of his students), raped, tortured, beaten, imprisoned, fired from jobs, threatened, in one case expelled from the country (a saintly human rights priest) and Honduras' democracy was being dismantled.

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Congressional Travel to Honduras Used to Support US Lawmaker's Business Interests

Posted by Erin Rosa - December 20, 2010 at 5:40 pm

GOP Congressman Traveled With Campaign Contributors and Promoted Their Business Interests to Coup Regime
In addition to using taxpayer money to travel to Honduras to support a coup d'état, one US Congressman, Republican Dana Rohrabacher (pictured right), used the trip as an opportunity to back the business interests of his campaign contributors, according to a State Department cable recently released by WikiLeaks.

The US Embassy in Honduras assisted Rohrabacher's partners in their investment ventures, according the document, by arranging meetings between the businessmen and a US government-financed corporation that is tied to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and gave millions to the coup regime.

When Rep. Rohrabacher (Calif.) traveled to Honduras on Jan. 31-Feb. 2 he brought along some personal friends, which included “several American businessmen and investors” according to the State Department memo, written by US Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens.

The president of California-based company SG Biofuels, Kirk Haney, was a part of the delegation, along with John R. Saunders, a California real estate developer who deals in antique coins. Both Haney and Saunders are campaign donors and were given the chance to advertise their businesses during discussions with top Honduran officials.

In the State Department cable Llorens writes that while in Honduras Rohrabacher “endorsed US investment and particularly lauded the benefits of the development of biofuel industry in Honduras. He enthusiastically promoted a start-up biofuel company, SG Biofuels.”
Saunders has told media outlets that during the trip he talked about “buying or at least helping arrange the sale of rare antique American coins from Honduras’s gold reserves” as he met with officials like the head of the Central Bank of Honduras.

(MORE)

http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebook/erin-rosa/2010/12/congressional-travel-honduras-used-support-us-lawmakers-business-interest

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THANK YOU ERIN ROSA AND NARCONEWS FOR THIS FINE BIT OF REPORTING!

CHECK OUT THE AUTHENTIC JOURNALISM AT NARCONEWS!: narconews.com

:applause: :applause: :applause:

[EFerrari]

3. Not a soul up here moved a muscle when we found out

they were kidnapping journalists, torturing them and dumping them out on the highway.

No one.

[Judi Lynn]

2. WikiLeaks Expose Questionable Details From Dana Rohrabacher's Visit to Honduras

WikiLeaks Expose Questionable Details From Dana Rohrabacher's Visit to Honduras
By Matt Coker, Mon., Dec. 20 2010 @ 4:54 PM

R. Scott Moxley told you in October about Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) having inserted himself in the violent 2009 coup that toppled the democratically elected president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya.

•Was Dana Rohrabacher Playing Kingmaker in Central America?

To refresh your memory, that post ended with the Surfin' Congressman having traveled to Honduras in January to let the newly elected government--the choice of that country's oligarchy and rightwing military--know that Republicans in the U.S. supported them.

Thanks to WikiLeaks, we now know more about his "unusual delegation."

That's the description the New York Times uses in today's piece about Rohrabacher being accompanied by a group of California real estate investors and businessmen, including a dealer in rare coins, and top executives from a fledgling San Diego biofuels company run by a friend of the congressman's wife, Rhonda Carmony.

More:
http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2010/12/dana_rohrabacher_honduras_coup.php