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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 TEGUCIGALPA 000687 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR WHA/CEN 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/28/2019 
TAGS: PHUM PGOV SOCI DS SNAR HO
SUBJECT: TFHO1: HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION POST-COUP UPDATE 5 
 
REF: TEGUCIGALPA 605 AND PREVIOUS 
 
Classified By: Ambassador Hugo Llorens for reasons 1.4 (b and d). 
 
¶1. (C) Summary:  The Honduran human rights situation continues 
to be difficult as tensions rise in the prolonged 
political uncertainty.  Another aggravating factor has been 
the presence of President Manuel "Mel" Zelaya and the First 
Lady Xiomara Castro de Zelaya on opposite sides of the 
Honduran-Nicaraguan border.  Honduran security forces have 
become more aggressive while confronting hostile groups 
and/or protesters, leading to more violence.  An American 
Citizen filming the June 26 melee at the stadium was 
assaulted by Honduran National Police (HNP) officers and 
had her camera taken.  HNP began a policy of breaking up 
roadblocks on July 30, and on that same day a confrontation 
between police and protesters resulted in a violent clash 
in Tegucigalpa.  Post will continue to monitor the 
situation and verify all accusations of human rights 
violations.  End Summary. 
 
--------------------------- 
BORDER TENSIONS REMAIN HIGH 
--------------------------- 
 
¶2. (C) The first family's presence along the 
border of Honduras and GOH security forces measures to 
prevent protesters from reaching President Zelaya in 
Nicaragua continued to be a flashpoint for more violence in 
Honduras.  (Note:  It has been reported that the First Lady 
and her sons and daughters returned to Tegucigalpa last 
night. 
End Note)  The curfew at the border is reported to be, 
in-effect, 24 hours, which eliminates any freedom of travel 
to and from the area.  The human rights Center for the 
Investigation and Promotion of Human Rights (CIPRODEH) 
reported on July 28 that over 75 detained protesters were 
being transported against their will from the border area 
to either the city of Danli or Tegucigalpa. 
 
¶3. (C) Those attempting to reach the border zone must get 
past five checkpoints and three road blocks reporting 
taking all day to do so.  The human rights NGO CODEH has 
issued a legal appeal to the Constitutional validity of the 
curfew and has documented over 85 people who have been 
detained along the border for breaking curfew. 
 
¶4. (C) After leaving Tegucigalpa in the morning, the 
Special Prosecutor for Human Rights (SPHR), German 
Enamorado, reached the border zone at approximately 17:00 
hours with six human rights lawyers on July 27.  The group 
was delayed negotiating each crossing of five checkpoints 
and three road blocks in place from Tegucigalpa to Las 
Manos along the Nicaraguan border.  SPHR was investigating 
the killing of Pedro Ezequiel, whose body was found on July 
25 approximately 300 meters from where protesters had been 
camping.  Testimonies indicate that the crime did not occur 
where the body was found as no one reporting hearing a 
struggle.  Three witnesses claim to have seen Ezequiel 
taken into custody by HNP officers on July 24 and human 
rights groups are currently analyzing footage from the 24th 
to see if Ezequiel appears on video of the demonstrations. 
 
¶5. (C) The six human rights lawyers met with approximately 
40 protesters who claimed they had been living in the 
mountains to avoid the security forces who had attempted to 
force them to leave the area.  They claimed that the 
majority of protesters who were able to cross into 
Nicaragua were being taken care of by Nicaraguan 
humanitarian groups and only those trapped on the Honduran 
side were suffering from intimidation and lack of water and 
food.  They estimated that there are approximately 500 
protesters remaining in the border area on July 29. 
 
¶6. (C) There are as-yet uncorroborated reports that a 
pregnant woman was raped by members of security forces in 
the El Paraiso Department the weekend of July 25-26 and 
another women was detained and repeatedly terrorized with 
threats of sexual abuse.  Poloff is working to verify these 
allegations and to get more information on the victims. 
 
---------------------------------- 
VIOLENCE ERUPTS AFTER SOCCER MATCH 
 
TEGUCIGALP 00000687  002 OF 004 
 
 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) An example of the increasingly aggressive measures 
Honduran security forces are taking was the violence that 
erupted between police officers and youth spectators at the 
stadium which claimed two Honduran lives and left 15 
injured following a soccer match between cross-town rivals 
on July 26.  Preliminary news reports indicate that the two 
deaths include one youth who was shot in the throat and 
another who appeared to have been beaten to death by rival 
supporters.  Between two to six other victims are reported 
to be in serious conditions, with at least two having also 
been shot.  Twenty-six cartridges of bullets for .45 
caliber and 9 millimeter handguns have been recovered at 
the crime scene.  The HNP maintains that the melee began 
after a passenger on a passing bus opened fire on officers 
while leaving the stadium. 
 
¶8. (C) Both teams' supporters have founded youth gangs 
known as "barras bravas" associated with small-scale drug 
pushing, misdemeanor crimes, and rival gang violence. 
These groups have been a growing problem on game days for 
the past two years.  Much of the blame for the crime has 
been placed either on the "barras" or the aggressive action 
taken by the police against them.  However, according to 
their parents, both youths killed were not members of the 
"barras" but rather university students enjoying the 
football match.  Congressman Emilio Cabrera, who is on a 
Congressional Commission named to tackle the issue, told 
Poloff on July 29 that the GOH response will be to mount 
several cameras in and around the stadium as a deterrent 
for bad behavior. 
 
------------------------- 
AMCIT ASSAULTED BY POLICE 
------------------------- 
 
¶9. (C) Tamar Maya Sharabi, an American citizen from New 
York who resides and works in Honduras for the Agua Para el 
Pueblo NGO, claims she was assaulted and had her camera 
taken by HNP in Tegucigalpa on July 26.  While filming the 
violent clashes between police and youth at the stadium, 
Sharabi claims she was stopped and then followed by a 
policeman who was asking for her camera.  While hurrying 
away from him, she suddenly found herself surrounded by 15 
policemen who proceeded to grab her, throw her on the 
ground, hit her with a baton twice, and pull her hair until 
she let go of her video camera. 
 
¶10. (C) Sharabi claims there were few witnesses because she 
was assaulted behind a police vehicle (identified as M1-14) 
but that she was able to remember two names of her 
attackers (Cadena and Gomez).  After the incident, she 
continued on to the Honduran Teaching Hospital with a 
friend who promised to help her get her camera back.  While 
at the hospital, she contacted HNP official Mejia who 
promised to advise the officer in charge at the stadium to 
help her find her camera.  Upon return to the stadium, 
Sharabi recognized Officers Cadena and Gomez who fled the 
scene immediately after she identified them.  She offered 
to try and identify some of the other policemen who assaulted 
her but the official in charge told her that was not 
necessary and that he did not know anything about her 
camera. 
 
¶11. (C) The following day July 27, Sharabi went to Police 
post M1-14 that she had identified on the police car while 
she was assaulted but received no assistance.  She then 
went to the Center for the Prevention, Treatment and 
Rehabilitation of Victims of Torture (CPRTR) which assisted 
her in filing a formal complaint with the Public Ministry 
(MP).  Poloff met with Sharabi for over an hour on July 28 
at the Embassy and remains in contact. 
 
----------------------------- 
MILITARIZATION OF A COMMUNITY 
----------------------------- 
 
¶12. (U) According to Spanish lawyer and human rights 
activist Enrique Santiago, the community of Guadalupe 
Carney in Colon Department has been overtaken by the 15th 
Battalion of the Honduran Armed Forces (HOAF).  The 
community was established in 2000 through land reform and 
 
TEGUCIGALP 00000687  003 OF 004 
 
 
has a history of violence between peasants and land-owners 
with the military intervening at times.  In August of 2008, 
11 land-owners were killed by peasants stemming from the 
land dispute.  Santiago claims that the pro-Micheletti "El 
Heraldo" newspaper reports on July 16th claiming that the 
military had found armed terrorist cells is false and that 
the community has been terrorized by security forces 
aligned with "paramilitary" types because it is deemed as 
anti-coup and pro-Zelaya. 
 
------------------- 
TRANSVESTITE KILLED 
------------------- 
 
¶13. (U) Vicky Hernandez Castillo's badly beaten body was 
found on June 29 in San Pedro Sula after working the night 
of the 28th as a sex worker.  Human rights groups are 
inferring that she was killed by security forces given that 
the curfew was in effect.  However, Castillo's death is 
consistent with a trend of persecution and violence 
directed towards transvestite sex workers documented by 
American NGO Human Rights Watch whose recently released 
report found that 17 had been killed since 2004. 
 
---------- 
THE CURFEW 
---------- 
 
¶14. (C) The veracity and application of the curfew is 
questionable as it has been used mostly as a tool by the de 
facto regime to prevent protests, limit civil liberties, 
and control the resistance movement.  As such it is 
ratcheted up or down depending on the plans or protests of 
the opposition to the de facto regime.  Human rights groups 
have filed an appeal to the curfew with the justice system 
because according to Constitutional Article 187 taking 
measures such as suspending civil liberties are only 
permissible in cases of territorial invasion, grave 
disturbances to peace, an epidemic or another calamity. 
 
--------------------------- 
POLICE BREAK UP ROAD BLOCKS 
--------------------------- 
 
¶15. (SBU) HNP instituted a new policy to break up 
pro-Zelaya roadblocks on July 30, and following their first 
action to carry out this policy, police and protesters 
clashed violently.  HNP reports that around 100 protesters 
were arrested, including independent presidential candidate 
and pro-Zelaya "Popular Bloc" leader Carlos H. Reyes, who 
suffered a broken arm and other injuries in the melee (he 
was soon afterwards released).  In the clashes, teacher 
Roger Vallejo was shot in the head and seriously wounded. 
However, HNP maintain that they only utilized nonlethal 
measures, i.e. rubber bullets and tear gas, to break up 
the protests and claim Vallejo must have been shot by another 
protester.  C-Libre, a free press organization, claims that 
several journalists covering the protests, including Karen 
Mendez and Roger Guzman from TeleSUR, were beaten and had 
their 
cameras taken. 
 
¶16. (SBU) While breaking up a separate protest in 
Comayaguela (working class township in the metropolitan area 
of Tegucigalpa), a protester allegedly stole a police 
officer's 
gun and then used it to shoot and wound a second officer. 
HNP are expecting another day of large protests based on 
reports that the First Lady has returned to Tegucigalpa. 
 
------- 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶17. (C) The human rights situation is slowly deteriorating 
due to rising tensions and continued political 
uncertainty.  Security forces have become more forceful and 
aggressive while dealing with protesters and perceived 
hostile groups such as rowdy youth gangs.  The de facto 
regime has allowed its offices in charge of investigating 
human rights abuses to weaken by sending away its lead 
Special Prosecutor for Human Rights to a course in Chile. 
The Commissioner of Human Rights has become an apologist 
 
TEGUCIGALP 00000687  004 OF 004 
 
 
for the coup.  Post will continue to support civil society 
groups in their defense of human rights and liaise with 
other donor entities in Honduran to coordinate efforts to 
support the human rights of all Hondurans. 
LLORENS