Honduras: Death squads escalate killings

The revival of death squads in Honduras has resulted in a significant increase in the abduction, rape, torture and murder of opponents of the regime that overthrew elected President Manuel Zelaya last June.

Death squads tied to the regime have increased their activity in the weeks after the fraudulent November 29 elections, which were boycotted by at least 65% of the population.

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A January 1 statement by the Committee of the Families of the Disappeared and Detained of Honduras said: "This week's kidnapping, disappearance, torture and interrogation of journalist Cesar Omar Silva by a street patrol with military training confirms the existence of a pattern of systematic violations of human rights committed by the same structure that violated the constitutional order on June 28, 2009.

"The recent, related murders of Walter Trochez and Edwin Renan Fajardo [and] the sustained kidnappings and attacks on the staff of El Libertador and Radio Globo … confirms that a death squad with a terrorist infrastructure is operating in the country with the knowledge of the Police and the Army.

"In addition, the violent deaths of other [FNRG] members carried out in a selective manner by hit men in the service of the de facto regime, and the pursuit, disappearance, torture and interrogation of independent journalists, repeats the pattern of the 1980s-1990s, which left a tragic legacy of political assassinations and hundreds of forced disappearances."

A January 13 Argenpress.info article also said that since the June coup, 19 gay rights activists have been assassinated.

From GLW issue 822