Today Honduras is recognized as one of the most violent countries in the world, with the highest per capita murder ratio in the Western hemisphere. Homicides, feminicides, political persecution, disappearances and targeted assassinations have escalated since the 2009 military coup against elected President Manuel Zelaya.
Violence Against Social Sectors of Society
Women: The national homicide rate for women is 14.6 per 100,000 inhabitants, making Honduras one of the most violent and dangerous places for women in the world according to the community based Jesuit station, Radio Progreso.
The Women´s Rights Observatory in Honduras determines that one of every two deaths are registered as feminicide. Just from January to April 2014 more than 152 violent deaths against women were documented involving disappearances and sexual violence. In 2013, 3,000 cases of sexual violence against women and 200 disappearances were documented. Every 18 hours a woman is killed in Honduras.
Journalists: The Radio Progreso reporter, Carlos Mejía was the victim of a violent death in May 2014. His death, like so many politically motivated assassinations in Honduras, has received little to no institutional investigation.
International journalists have been detained, including reporters for teleSUR, while others have received death threats or have been murdered.
Social and Political Leaders: Politically motivated assassinations have affected all sectors of Honduran civil society from rural farm workers, indigenous peoples and populations of African descent, women, youth, queer LGBT communities, left party LIBRE candidates and other communities.
LGBT: approximately 176 LGBT Hondurans have been murdered since the coup d´état.
Repression by State Forces
Last year, the Honduran government under recently elected President Juan Orlando Hérnandez created a new police unit known as the Intelligence Troop and Special Security Group, or TIGRES (Tigers, in Spanish). The TIGRES are trained by U.S. special forces and the Colombian Jungle School in intelligence, mountain operations and rural operations as reported by anti-militarization organization, School of the Americas Watch.
On May 28, the Fraternal Black Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH) denounced the "indiscriminate violence" used by the security forces in the region against community members from Puerto Castilla demanding back their ancestral land. The confrontation between security and the community ended up with six children hospitalized in Trujillo as the security forces used tear gas to control the demonstrators.
On May 13, the Military police and COBRAS launched tear gas and beat with batons several LIBRE party congresspeople as they protested during a congressional session. People demonstrating outside Congress were also attacked with tear gas. Several LIBRE members were taken to the hospital because of tear gas inhalation and Military police physical attacks.
On May 25, police tortured two Rio Blanco residents where the indigenous Lenca people have been resisting a hydroelectric dam. The two organizers were taken to a home and beat. Their heads were forced under water, almost drowned and placed in rubber hoods that prevented them from breathing.
These cases are few examples of hundreds in Honduras. And yet, despite all the violence the people continue to resist, demand justice and an end to impunity.
