The military coup was launched by the country’s handful of ultra-wealthy families who control most of the nation’s economy. Thousands of Hondurans protested the coup, but they were physically beaten by the Honduran military. It was an indicative onset as the coup launched a dramatic shift towards brutal fascism under the “Pepe” Lobo administration. Honduras had a serious problem with violence and corruption long before Lobo took over, but his response made the problems much worse by militarizing the police force. The former Police Commissioner María Luisa Borjas admitted, “It’s scarier to meet up with five police officers on the streets than five gang members.” Mind you, Honduras has by far highest murder rate in the world with gang violence …show more content…
Record numbers of reporters were murdered during the Lobo administration. Without a doubt, a Honduran nightly news broadcast in September of 2010 captured just how casually the Honduran elite consider murdering independent journalists. News cameras captured a verbal confrontation between a reporter and Adolfo Facussé, part of Honduras’ wealthiest family and a chief facilitator of the coup. After the verbal exchange, cameras filmed one of Facussé’s goons asking him if he wanted the reporter killed; this happened with absolutely no legal repercussions. The Lobo administration downplayed the political nature of the numerous journalists’ deaths and often found drug traffickers to be fine scapegoats for those …show more content…
Thus, the human rights record of the Hernández administration has been even worse than Lobo’s. As a result, politically motivated violence has seemingly increased. In fact, the former leader of a Honduran police death squad and SOA graduate, Juan Carlos “El Tigre” Bonilla, was hired as the national police chief. With Bonilla at the helm, the Associated Press reported in 2013 about roughly 150 murders by state sponsored death squads in the capital city alone with more in the surrounding areas. “It has been made clear to the State Department that no units under General Bonilla’s control should receive U.S. assistance without credible information refuting the serious allegations against him,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT). Yet, the Obama administration has supported the Hernández administration and offered further economic assistance to Honduras. This is an obvious unspoken message to the rest of the world, particularly Latin America. The U.S. will support your regime as long as you’re a military and economic
A consequence of this massacre is the enhanced mistrust of the police force in the favelas. This is because the people of the favela are afraid that the police could come into their homes at anytime and shot everyone, or that the police could do anything they want without repercussions for it, while the favela residents could not do anything unless they wanted to get
Vargas of Brazil took power using a military coup which allowed new ideas of politics to be represented instead of the previous political control. Vargas centralized power by putting power in the hands of the federal government, which angered local government authorities and even replaced the local leader with new forms of elections. Vargas was able to make many changes because he had authoritarian power through the federal government, but overpowering state government he created a hostile and segregated political system. Vargas nationalized rail and sea transportation, which let him have full control of the country corporation’s shipments. Vargas wanted to support workers so he built houses for urban workers. Vargas was able to take full credit
So, they began feeding the public information about Noriega’s involvement in drug trafficking in order to undermine him. Noriega’s involvement in drug trafficking was soon placed in a number of news articles. Unfortunately, at that time, the general agreement was that the cost of military intervention would outweigh whatever benefits they could hope to gain. In addition, Noriega had considerable knowledge of U.S. military and intelligence (Robinson, 190). Because Washington had no wish to be defeated as they had in previous wars during the Cold War, and Noriega was not an imminent threat, they chose to restrain themselves from using military force.
After only 12 year of the PRI being out ruled by the PAN many worried about what this would mean to new establish democracy in Mexico. So why was it that the PRI came to win the election is there was a concern with the PRI party? Well for starters, the people weren’t happy with how the PAN had handled their regime and the Peña Nieto administration was promising everything the PAN hadn’t changed. Additionally, Peña Nieto was promising a changed PRI party that would not be the same as the PRI that ruled for 70 years.
Vigilantes are undertaking the task of the police in handling the issue. Berehulak noted, “J.R. [the drug victim’s eldest son] said the man in the helmet said, “Goodbye, my friend,” before shooting his father [Crisostomo Diaz, 51] in the chest. His body sank, but the man shot him twice more, in the head and cheeks. The children said the three men were laughing as they left.” A laugh that stands for finding joy in killing people reveals that the vigilantes bloodlust and nonchalant attitude towards killing. These set of circumstances evidently exhibit the intention of destroying a man’s right. Although the vigilantes are vindicated by their own deeds, the actions that they had shown is inhumane. Not only do they murder the pitiful sufferers of this war, but they treat these individuals as if they are animals. In addition to clarify this case, Berehulak also said that some bodies were found on the streets with their heads wrapped in packing tape. Others were left with crude cardboard signs labeling victims as dealers or addicts. They did this to a dead body just to humiliate and remove the decency of a person. This reveals they do not pity or show compassion towards these victims. Moreover, it is an awfully shameful fate that a person can have. That is why vigilantes shouldn’t be slaughtering individuals with their own hands. Rather they should inform the police officials to take over the mission that are appointed to them.
The Guatemalan civil war that emerged out of the political chaos created by the U.S. intervention took upwards of 200,000 lives. It was during the civil war that we “first saw such phenomena as death squads and ‘disappearances,’ which subsequently became standard operating procedure in counterinsurgency wars throughout the hemisphere. U.S. military advisers were involved in the formation of the death squads, and the head of the U.S. military mission publicly justified their operations (Jonas, 1996: 146-147; see also Smith, 1990: 9-10; Quigley, 2006).”
Guatemala was at the beginning of “forty years of military rulers, death squads, and armed repression.” The interruption of the Guatemalan political process with a violent coup in 1954 disrupted the fragile Guatemalan government, not giving it a chance. As a result, “movements towards peaceful reform in the region were set back, [military] dictators strengthened and encouraged, and activists … to look to guerilla warfare rather than elections…to produce change.” The violent guerilla warfare tactics became a notable element of the bloody Guatemalan civil war in the
It first condemned what happened, however without actually naming it a ‘coup,’ probably because if it did it would have forced Washington to terminate its aid programme to Honduras. However, after the coups in Madagascar and Mauritania, the U.S. did not hesitate to immediately and totally stop their aid (Main, 2010; Weisbrot, 2011; Chomsky, 2010). It did not withdraw its ambassador from Tegucigalpa as the European countries did. The U.S. continued training Honduran officers and the IMF, after withdrawing loans to the Zelaya government following disagreements over his economic policies, provided a loan of 150$ million to the coup regime (Chomsky, 2010). Nonetheless, the U.S. did take some measures. They suspended their non-humanitarian aid, cancelled the visas of the leading members and supporters of the interim government but they did not resort to the most effective trade sanctions and slowly but surely diminished their support for Manuel Zelaya (Ruhl, 2010). They supported an agreement between him and Roberto Micheletti, the interim president, that would create a unity government and reinstate Manuel Zelaya. However, when this turned sour, the Obama administration did not move an inch (Ruhl, 2010). Washington then announced that the U.S. would recognise the November elections, giving very little hope to President Zelaya’s of ever coming back to power (Rulh, 2010; Main, 2010). The negotiations proposed by
Honduras has a serious amount of homicides occurring in their community. Within their economy, Honduras is one of the poorest countries, with about 65% of their citizens living in poverty. During his term, President Zelaya stirred controversy among the country through acts of reforming the constitution and making unethical policy decisions (U.S. Department of State, 2011). Honduras has been ranked the most violence country on the globe. This accounts for the one death per hour ratio that is due to political views of Zelaya, inequality among citizens, and organized crime (B-Lajoie, D’Andrea, Rodriquez, Greenough, Patel, 2014). These occurrences of homicide are a critical aspect of Honduras mental health and well being that desperately needs to be changed for the lives of their citizens.
In the Brazilian region of Espírito Santo, the police went on strike to protest a severe drop in budget of the police department. In addition, they were protesting a large drop in the salaries of civil servants in Brazil. However, during only three days of the strike, fifty-two homicides occurred (“Police Strike”). Espírito Santo is often considered the most violent region in southeastern Brazil, but this region’s homicide rates noticeably decreased in 2016. Espírito Santo was on track to become much more peaceful in 2016, but this event greatly increased the homicide and murder rates, effectively undoing the progress made in 2016. The state of general anarchy and lawlessness in Espírito Santo during the police strike has drawn comparisons to the movie The Purge (“Police Strike”).
Unemployment is considered a social problem in which has affected every country in the world. This social problem cause others issues such as poverty, drug trafficking, delinquency, economic decrease in families because millions of people are unemployed and this makes a cycle of problems in a community. In Honduras, this problem is considered the mother of the social issues occurred in this country in which is making it one of the poorest countries in the world with a high rate of unemployment. People that are the most affected in this social issue are the young, women, elderly, and people who has no experience or studies. As a social problem there are many cases of unemployment and one of those is from a woman named Raquel Nazareth.
Largely middle-class demonstrators swarmed key landmarks and blocked main thoroughfares across Buenos Aires. As protesters demanded the resignation of the unpopular de la Rua, police were forced to clear the peaceful demonstration (Gardner 9). In the Plaza de Mayo, which has seen some of the bloodiest and most historic moments in Argentina’s rocky political past, officers swung batons, fired rubber bullets and tear gas, and aimed water cannon (see illustration 1) on the throngs of demonstrators besieging the Casa Rosada.
The capital, despite a reduction in homicides in relation to last year, is still in the first place for this crime. According to the Violence Observatory of the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH), of the 25 most violent municipalities in the country, the Central District is sait to be the first on the list. This title is given by the number of violent deaths, being reported 346 homicides from January to June.
Indeed, these countries share certain backgrounds, such economic crisis in the 1980s and the 1990s and the consequential foreign debt and adjustment policies, high inequality, poverty, and a skyrocketing corruption that came afterwards. Expressed in particular local tones, these features have framed Latin America’s entrance to neoliberalism during the 1990s. Violence in different shapes is also a common ground for Latin American societies, but with different patterns. For example, drug trafficking and drug lords’ violence –eventually in partnership with local authorities- are rather a familiar experience for Colombian and Mexican media workers, while political state violence was a landmark during dictatorships in South America. Cases of these unlikely experiences of violence against journalists populate this landscape. Colombian editor, Guillermo Cano, was killed by gunmen in Medellín (Colombia) in the 1980s, as well as occurred to Javier Valdez in Cualiacán (México) in 2017; while reporters Rodolfo Walsh and José Carrasco Tapia were victims of state polices’ brutality in Argentina in the 1970s and in Chile in the 1980s, respectively. Although violence was the shared feature of these cases, the contexts, the driven forces, and the journalists as targets vary.
“We need to embrace our loved ones no matter what we believe in. We need to come together and no other event could remind us of the need for solidarity.” At ten o’clock on July 15, 2016, news anchor Tijen Karas for Turkish Radio and Television was forced to read a statement by insurgents calling themselves the Peace at Home Committee, in reference to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk’s—the founder of the Turkish Republic—famous mantra “Peace at home, Peace in the world.” As rebels held Karas at gunpoint, she read a declaration by of military plotters against the government claiming secular and democratic law had diminished under Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Filkins 2). Established on the basis of secularism, the Turkish constitution provides the military with the authority to intervene in the government to maintain democracy and prevent Islamic nationalists from gaining power. The recent attempted coup in Turkey, believed to have been led by forces loyal to exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, was inspired by an alternative to a near-authoritarian regime of President Erdogan. The failure of the coup provided President Erdogan with even greater powers, which has resulted in the loss of freedoms in Turkey and in dire consequences to the wider world.