<p><span style="font-size: large;"><strong>“STATISTICS AND FACES OF THE REPRESSION” - VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE CONTEXT OF THE COUP D’ÉTAT IN HONDURAS<br>
</strong></span><span style="font-size: medium;">By Bertha Oliva, General Coordinator of COFADEH, Tegucigalpa, Honduras - October 22, 2009</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">[Thanks to Quixote Center </span><a href="http://www.quixote.org/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: medium;">www.quixote.org</span></a><span style="font-size: medium;"> and Rights Action for distributing this information from COFADEH]</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">I am a veteran human rights
defender. As I prepared the second human rights report since the coup
in Honduras, “Statistics and Faces of the Repression - Violations of
Human Rights in the context of the coup d’état,” I have felt profound
distress. Perhaps because I had begun to think that during the long
process of the last decades, we had made some small advances in the
area of human rights.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">Perhaps it is because I look to the
past in order to see the future, and to evaluate and to value the
present - that today, over 100 days since the fateful coup on June
28th, I realize that something has shaken the Committee of Families of
the Detained and Disappeared of Honduras, COFADEH to the core, and
nothing is the same. Immediately after the coup we knew that we had
regressed 25 – 30 years, maybe more.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">As the impact of the blow set in,
we realized that we are now in the midst of a modern Military Coup
d’état in the 21st Century. Unfortunately, we are well versed in the
effects of military dictators and we understood that what we were
witnessing was not an isolated act but an entire strategy to seize and
hold power for the long term; in other words, the dictatorship intends
to stay in the Region.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">We realized that if such an offense
could be committed against the person who holds the highest office in
the country, what would happen to the rest of the population. We began
to prepare ourselves. The military dictatorship wasted no time.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">Today, just as in the past, we are the depository for tears, anguish, pain and hopelessness.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">The military dictatorship that we
live under today is very similar to that of the decade of the 1980s,
however, there is an important difference. During the 1980s, those who
repressed the people hid their faces and their names. Today, those who
repress the people have names, faces and uniforms: “blue-green – olive
and white.”</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">In our second human rights report
we have focused our concerns on the actions that the X Battalion, based
in Marcala (La Paz), has carried out against members of the throughout
the zone, including the region of Colomoncagua. Similar levels of
persecution are also being suffered by people in the Department of
Santa Barbara on the part of authorities of the de facto regime in this
Department.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">Another of our primary concerns is
the strategy employed by the military dictatorship against teachers in
the country which includes illegal and arbitrary retention of salaries,
profiling, legal suits brought against them by the Public Ministry,
persecution, illegal detentions and even assassination.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">With indignation and pain we must
condemn and repudiate the persecution unleashed on the youth of our
country. To some we have had to say, “until we meet again in another
country” in order to prevent them becoming victims of kidnapping,
torture and assassination…And to other young people we have said,
“goodbye, we will meet again in the next world.”</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">Based on proof and documentation in
our possession, we affirm to the world that we are living a situation
of NATIONAL EMERGENCY in Honduras. We appeal to the International
Community to stay vigilant and observant in order to assume the
challenge of bringing those who perpetrate crimes against humanity to
justice.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: medium;">Bertha Oliva de Nativi, General Coordinator<br>
COFADEH - Barrio La Plazuela, Avenida Cervantes, #1301, AP 1243, </span><a href="mailto:mail@cofadeh.org" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: medium;">mail@cofadeh.org</span></a><span style="font-size: medium;">, </span><a href="http://www.cofadeh.org/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: medium;">www.cofadeh.org</span></a></p>
<span style="font-size: medium;"></span>