by Rights Action
On the Day of the National Survey for Constitutional Reform, the Honduran president was captured by the military. According to reports from national human rights organizations, at approximately 1am the president of Honduras, Mel Zelaya and his family were captured by the military. 

 

 

He was taken to a military airport. He denounced the military coup and his capture to TeleSur over the telephone from Costa Rica.

It is also reported that other members of the government, particularly the ministers, are being arrested, and that cars with diplomatic license plates are being stopped and searched to facilitate the detentions.

Robert Michelletti, one of the strongest opponents of the president and president of the Congress, is rumored to be backed by the military to assume the presidency.

Communications have been interrupted.  The national press, all strongly opposed to the president, is silent.  Channel 8, established by President Zelaya after years of press censorship, and was shut down.  Community radios have been cut off.

Nationally the national telephone system was shut down, and the national energy grid has been shut down in many areas. The national telephone system was temporarily cut off, and in some areas cellular phones are not longer operating.

The military is occupying the entire county, and has established checkpoints in the entry and exits of towns, presumably to restrict
protesters and possibly to facilitate detentions. Despite the military occupation there are protests throughout the
country and repression is being report.

We are extremely concerned for the safety of the human rights organizations that have supported the President and the efforts for
Constitutional Reform. Currently there are reports of the military pursuing civil society leaders in the street.  COPINH, the National Council of Indigenous Peoples has strongly backed the constitutional reform effort.

 

The home of Bertha Caceres, a leader of COPINH, has been under military and police surveillance for several days. Today leaders of COPINH have been pursued by the military in the street, and are in hiding.

On Tuesday of last week Fabio Ochoa, the regional coordinator promoting the Constitutional reform consultations, was shot five times when leaving a television station after promoting the constitutional reform.  He is in intensive care.

The proposal to draft a new constitution is the culmination of a series of controversial measures undertaken in his presidency, which
include a significant raise in the minimum wage, measures to re-nationalize energy generation plants and the telephone system, signing a bill that vastly improves labor conditions for teachers, joining the Venezuelan Petrocaribe program which provides soft loans for development initiatives via petroleum sales, delaying recognition of the new US ambassador after the Bolivian government implicated the US embassy in supporting fascist paramilitary groups destabilizing Bolivia, and others.

 

 

info@rightsaction.org

 

Sun, Jun 28, 2009 at 12:39 PM
HONDURAS - Military Coup Happening Now !!!!

ALERT - Military Coup in Honduras
June 28, 2009, 2pm

[CONTACT: In Guatemala, Annie Bird (Rights Action co-director,
annie@rightsaction.org, 011-502-5005-1530); in North America, Grahame
Russell (Rights Action co-director, 1-860-751-4285,
info@rightsaction.org)]

1-  please re-distribute this information to media and your politicians
2-  demand respect for safety and human rights of all Hondurans
3-  demand a return of the constitutional government

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Please re-distribute this info all around.  

 

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The Government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela condemns the coup d’état that the Honduran oligarchy is attempting to perpetrate against the constitutional government of President Manuel Zelaya Rosales and the people of Honduras.

President Manuel Zelaya Rosales was kidnapped, removed from his home by force, rendered incommunicado for several hours, and violently expelled from his country by a group of unpatriotic, coup-mongering soldiers. The hooded soldiers kidnapped Chancellor Patricia Rodas and also arbitrarily detained and beat the Ambassadors of Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. These shameless soldiers are responsible before national and international laws for the crimes that they are committing and for the violation of the constitution and its laws.

The government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela strongly urges the international community to condemn this situation and urges that the necessary measures be taken by us to defeat this coup d’état in Honduras and to reestablish the legitimate government of President Manuel Zelaya Rosales.


Caracas, June 28, 2009
Ministry of People's Power for Foreign Affairs/ Translation by the Press Unit of the Embassy of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to the United States