News Release

Honduras: Will a Coup Continue to Stand?

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ANDRES THOMAS CONTERIS
Andrés Thomas Conteris is director of Nonviolence International’s Program on the Americas. He is in contact with various political groups and officials in Honduras, is available for interviews and can also facilitate arranging interviews with others. He is also founder of Democracy Now! en Español and was on Democracy Now! recently.

HECTOR PERLA
SUYAPA G. PORTILLO VILLEDA
Hector Perla, a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Suyapa G. Portillo Villeda, a research fellow at Pomona College and originally from Honduras, are among 35 Latin America scholars and specialists who signed an open letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday urging against the idea of early elections in Honduras as a possible resolution of the current crisis resulting from the June 28 military coup d’etat. The letter states: “Anything less than the urgent restoration of President Manuel Zelaya to office would be an usurpation of the will of the Honduran people. Following resolutions by the United Nations General Assembly and the Organization of American States calling for Zelaya’s immediate and unconditional return to office, the U.S. must ensure his prompt restoration by enacting forceful economic sanctions against the regime.

“Each day that the illegal coup regime remains in office further jeopardizes the capacity for Honduras to enjoy free and fair elections in November, let alone in an earlier time frame. Elections currently would take place under a coup regime that has suspended civil liberties, and where the conditions for free elections do not exist.”

MARK WEISBROT, [via Dan Beeton]
Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Weisbrot is the author of numerous papers and articles on Latin America. He just wrote the piece “Washington is unwilling to take the side of democracy in Honduras by opposing the coup leaders it helped to train,” published in the Guardian in the UK.

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167