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After
violently dispersing Zelaya supporters
outside of the Brazilian embassy on Sep.
22, Honduran police and army troops
continued their repressive actions
throughout the capital and the rest of
the country. Thousands of demonstrators
who took spontaneously to the streets
were repressed. The hospitals received
numerous injured protesters, many with
signs of torture. Hundreds were arrested
across the country, while in
Tegucigalpa detainees were herded to the
“Chochi Sosa” baseball stadium in an
action that brought to mind Chile’s dark
night.
Human rights organizations have not
ceased in their efforts to free
detainees, assist the injured and find
out whether rumors of dead demonstrators
are true.
President Manuel Zelaya spoke out
to the international community from the
Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa,
where he took refuge on Monday after
slipping back into the country,
denouncing the brutality of the de facto
regime, and said there was a plan to
assassinate him and make it look like a
suicide. The buildings around the
embassy were evacuated and occupied by
police and army forces, while reprisals
continued against the dozens of
supporters accompanying the Honduran
president in the embassy, with water and
power cut off and access severely
limited, so that food supplies are
unable to reach them.
“They’re threatening to take the
Brazilian embassy by force. I’ve
been alerted that there’s a plan to
assassinate me, and that they have a
forensic doctor ready to write my death
off as suicide,” Zelaya said in
an interview with Radio Globo.
“If I die you can be certain that it
won’t be because I committed suicide;
it’ll be an assassination, because I’m
determined to resist and fight to the
end.”
President Manuel Zelaya Rosales
also rejected the de facto government’s
proposal to open negotiations on
condition that Zelaya renounce
his demand to be reinstated, immediately
recognize the validity of the elections
and submit to the courts to face the
charges filed against him by the
prosecutor.
As tension in Honduras mounts to
unprecedented levels,
Sirel met with Bertha
Cáceres, member of the Executive
Committee of the Civic Council of
Popular and Indigenous Organizations of
Honduras (COPINH) and the joint
steering committee of the National
Front Against the Coup.
-In less than 24 hours the country went
from euphoria over the return of
President Zelaya to the harsh repression
of the army and the police. What is your
opinion of yesterday’s incidents?
-We condemn this as yet another human
rights violation against Hondurans. Many
of our people were unlawfully arrested,
accused of insurrection and taken to
illegal detention centers. It’s another
example of what these fascists and their
economic and military apparatus are
capable of doing. It proves that they’re
bent on holding on to power by means of
a dictatorship.
In the poor neighborhoods and
communities of Tegucigalpa, the people
are standing up bravely to repression,
resisting the death project of the de
facto government. And their resistance
is growing stronger and stronger with
each passing day.
-President Zelaya is finally back in the
country like the people and the National
Front Against the Coup wanted, but the
de facto government has shown it’s not
willing to give up an inch of its power,
and it even mocks the international
community. What does the resistance
movement plan to do now?
-We have to be careful not to
underestimate this enemy of the Honduran
people, because it can bring out its
claws at any time, without giving a
second thought to what the national and
international say. We have to devise new
strategies without losing this
mobilizing force of the masses that has
characterized these 87 days of struggle.
The resistance movement has been
demanding that the president be
reinstated in office, not just that he
be allowed to return to the country, so
there’s still a lot to do. We also ask
for firmer action from the international
community, because so far it’s been very
slow to respond, and this has allowed
the coup perpetrators and the
dictatorship to settle into power and
drag out the situation, preventing a
solution.
-There are rumors that the government
plans to storm into the Brazilian
embassy and violently seize President
Zelaya. Would that be a mistake or would
it help the de facto government
consolidate its power?
-It would be a huge error because it
would cause greater upheaval, deepen the
crisis and trigger an enormous reaction
from the people. And we know that
they’re very capable of orchestrating an
assassination, which is why we’ve said
President Zelaya’s life is in
danger, and his people are also in
danger. This would intensify popular
protests.
-The resistance movement has described
this regime as dictatorial, despite the
de facto government’s constant efforts
to present itself as legitimate and
democratic. What are Hondurans really up
against?
-It’s a twenty-first century
dictatorship, which maintains some
features of the dictatorships of the
1970s and 1980s, but also deploys new
strategies to give an appearance of
democracy. However, there is no doubt
that it’s a dictatorship, with an
economic, political and military
apparatus that controls every branch of
the State, and its goal is to undermine
the processes of liberation that are
sweeping across our continent.
What’s most alarming is that this is a
new trend and it can be repeated at any
time in any country of the continent, so
it’s crucial that we put a stop to it
now.
-We are at a very complicated and
turbulent moment. What elements are
necessary to restore democracy and get
back on the path to freedom for the
Honduran people?
-We have to intensify popular struggle
and improve our organization efforts,
careful not to underestimate our enemy,
and pushing the international community
to take firmer action and cut the
sources of financing that are supporting
the regime.
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