Honduran police accused of illegally detaining Guapinol human rights defender

Last night, Arnol Javier Alemán, one of the eight Guapinol defenders who had been released in February 2022 after spending 29 months imprisoned in a process characterized as arbitrary, was detained by the Honduran National Police. According to the defense attorneys’, the police have stated that there is still an active arrest warrant for Arnol within the police system. The defense attorneys’ expressed their disappointment over the absence of a protocol between the Judicial Power, the Police, and the Public Prosecutor’s Office when a person is released. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Honduras (OHCHR) also expressed concern about this detention.

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How will the country defend itself against these multi-million dollar international lawsuits?

Six international claims against the Honduran State were submitted to arbitration at the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), an institution that is part of the World Bank and based in Washington D.C. Some of these claims were brought forward by the investment firm Zede Próspera, and two Norwegian renewable energy firms, Scatec and Norfund. While international arbitration experts are concerned about the defense of the Honduran State, the government questions the legality of the disputes since it doesn’t recognize ICSID’s jurisdiction.

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Straightening my hair for survival

Rosy Flores always wanted to be a criminal lawyer in El Progreso, a small and violent city in northern Honduras. Ten months passed before she decided to quit her job, a profession where women face a glass ceiling and threats come from all sides: from the accused but also from her fellow lawyers.

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In- depth investigations
Featured Investigation

Honduras, a paradise for disinformers 

They come from Colombia, Spain, the United States, Peru, Mexico, or Israel. They flourish in electoral campaigns. They are political consultants. This investigation reveals unspeakable secrets from international corporations that sold influence and victories in Honduras. Without regulations or transparency, it is unsurprising that Honduras holds the record for the most eliminated social media accounts in the Central American region for its involvement in coordinated and inauthentic disinformation campaigns.

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The shady story of Cerimedo, the advisor to South America’s Trumpist right wing

The Argentinean consultant, an excentric and provocative character, broke into South American politics in 2020 for his intervention in electoral campaigns in digital media for the far-right. Although his past is a mystery, Cerimedo has installed himself with controversial campaigns that included disinformation in Chile and Brazil. His next goal is to make far-right MP Javier Milei President of Argentina. By Iván Ruiz (CLIP), Manuel Carricone and Martín Slipczuk (Chequeado), Francisca Skoknic and Ignacia Velasco (LaBot), Alice Maciel and Laura

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Multimedia
drag queen honduras 2022

Indecency in the Open

Alexis Carrasco is sculpting Gallery, his other self. He has been doing it for ten years and is already an expert craftsman of the exhausting and painful work of momentarily transforming himself into a woman. First is the structure: foam rubber breasts, hips, and buttocks. That is the marble on which he sculpts his work.

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Al menos unas 350 familias se han refugiado bajo el puente de la salida a occidente, luego de las inundaciones provocadas por las tormentas tropicales Eta e Iota que devastaron el sector de Chamelecón. San Pedro Sula, 21 de noviembre de 2020. Foto: Martín Cálix.

Chamelecón: Neglected people rebuild

Approximately 350 families from the sector of Chamelecón are seeking refuge underneath a bridge; shelters are not an option. The families hope to avoid both flooding and the violence of the gangs who control their community.

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Podcast
EDITORIAL
migrant-mother encontramos a miriam una mujer que huyó de honduras huir

We Found Miriam

Miriam is a woman who fled from Honduras with her two year old son. The statement she gave in front of a United States immigration court describing her experience being separated from her son went viral after a video was published that showed a group of actors and other celebrities reading it aloud. Miriam is invisible, but hundreds of thousands heard her in the voices of these people that have everything, who have our attention every day.

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OPINION

Guatemala’s Semilla Party, from the unexpected to reality 

No one saw it coming. Not the polls, experts, political strategists, or the public, no one. We were disheartened, as it usually happens when darkness clouds our hopes for the future. We expected the worst, two female candidates from political parties made up of questionable people, some of who have been criminally convicted. We expected that institutions would fail and benefit what we call «the pact of corruption», nothing more than the culmination of a State run by criminals and opportunists, a political elite without any respect for democracy and a voracious appetite for power and business. There wasn’t any balance in power, not in political parties, society, or the international community.

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Congresista Norma Torres | EEUU | USA | Relación de estados unidos y Honduras

President-elect Xiomara Castro’s inauguration means new hope for Honduras

I just wrote a letter to the U.S. Department of Justice urging them to immediately indict and extradite former President Hernandez to be tried on drug-trafficking charges. Hernandez was identified as a co-conspirator in his brother’s case here in the United States, and the DOJ said that President Hernandez “played a leadership role in a violent, state-sponsored drug trafficking conspiracy.” Now we must seek justice for all the people – Americans, Hondurans, and others – who were harmed because of his administration.

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Photo galleries

The forgotten sorrows of Honduras’ Tolupan communities 

Indigenous Tolupan communities who live in the mountains of Yoro have to walk for hours to access basic health services, a debt owed to them by the State. When they arrive at the welfare center, no matter what ails them, there’s only acetaminophen available.

The bitter side of Honduras’ sugar industry

There are approximately 200,000 active workers during harvest season in the sugar industry in Honduras. Most are working under a subcontract for sugar refineries and are not protected by labor laws such as social security, unemployment, or retirement benefits. Payment varies according to the amount they harvest, and workers often earn less than the minimum wage. Those who earn more push their bodies to the limit and have to work on Sundays.

Extraditions from Honduras

Extraditions from Honduras through a camera lens

On Tuesday, January 31, at the Soto Cano air base, Arnaldo Urbina Soto, the former mayor of Yoro municipality, was handed over to the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) for extradition to the United States.

Section
Video

A Contracorriente Perspective

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