HONDURAS

Human Rights Developments

This was year of contradictions for human rights in Honduras. Although the government devoted unprecedented attention tofundamental human rights problems and took important steps towards their correction, members of the security forces continued to commit violent human rights violations. Abuse of authority, excessive use of force, and torture in custody were still common practices by the armed forces and the military-controlled police (FUSEP).

While structural problems in the administration of justice and the vast economic and political power of the armed forces continued to shield most military violators of human rights from prosecution, several cracks appeared in the armor during 1993. In July, history was made when civilian Judge María Mendoza de Castro sentenced retired Col. Angel Castillo Madariaga to sixteen years and six months in prison for the 1991 rape and murder of student Riccy Mabel Martínez Sevilla. He received ten years and six months for second- degree murder and six years (three less than the maximum penalty) for rape. Retired Sgt. Santos Eusebio Llovares Fúnez was sentenced to ten years and six months for second-degree murder. The third defendant in the case, Capt. Ovidio Andino Coello, was acquitted. To the best of our knowledge, this was the first time a high-ranking Honduran military officer had been convicted for a human rights violation.

The brutality of the case mobilized public opinion against the military. Students, women's groups, human rights organizations, and unaffiliated citizens joined forces to pressure the government for justice. Seventeen-year-old Martínez's mutilated body was found on July 15, 1991. She had last been seen two days earlier at the Las Tapias military base, seeking the release of her boyfriend who had been forcibly recruited.

U.S. Amb. Cresencio Arcos played a crucial role in the case by publicly demanding that justice be served and providing FBI services for forensic analysis which proved pivotal in the case.

On behalf of the Martínez family, lawyer Linda Rivera appealed the case, charging that Castillo and Llovares should have been convicted for first-degree murder, which carries a longer prison term and no chance of pardon.

Accusations of systematic violations of human rights were bolstered in February when former investigative-police agent Josué Eli Zúñiga Martínez publicly implicated the army and the police in at least seven assassinations, including the January 29, 1993, murder of businessman Eduardo Piña Van Tuyl. Zúñiga alleged that the army's infamous Battalion 3-16 was still in operation in San Pedro Sula, although the military had testified before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights of the Organization of American States that it was dissolved in 1987. Battalion 3-16's role in the disappearance of approximately 150 individuals between 1981 and 1984 was proven in a trial before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights which concluded in 1989. And although the military stated that the battalion had been dismantled, Americas Watch received testimony from a military defector in 1989 alleging that Battalion 3-16 continued to operate out of the 105th Infantry Brigade in San Pedro Sula long after its purported dissolution.

Public outrage provoked by the Piña case and Zúñiga's declarations, combined with significant pressure from the U.S. government, created a momentum against the armed forces difficult for the Rafael Callejas administration to ignore. In March, President Callejas created a high-level "Ad Hoc Commission" composed of representatives from the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government, the armed forces, the Catholic Church, political parties, and the media. The commission's most important recommendation was the creation of a new Public Ministry as an "independent, autonomous, professional and apolitical" government office to defend citizens' collective rights, headed by a civilian prosecutor elected by Congress. A new investigative police force called the Department of Criminal Investigations (DIC) was and to form part of the new Public Ministry.

The DIC was to replace the National Investigations Directorate (DNI), a police investigations unit notorious for egregious human rights violations. A three-member supervisory board, composed of two civilians and one military officer, was created to evaluate DNI personnel and prepare the transition. Americas Watch was concerned, however, that the new DIC would simply recycle the same agents who have been responsible for violent abuses at the DNI. We urged the government to screen the new personnel thoroughly to ensure that those with a history of abuse were not employed in the new police force.

Another concern was the evident reluctance of the armed forces to allow an effective transfer. Americas Watch learned from reliable sources that the military was stripping the DNI of its computers, telephones, and other equipment. This would leave the new DIC with little or no basic infrastructure and would contribute to the fulfillment of the military's prophecy that a civilian body could not function so well as one controlled by the armed forces.

The law to establish the Public Ministry was still on the agenda for debate in Congress as of November. Discussion of the law had been postponed until after the November 28 presidential elections, and there was little hope that Congress would debate the law in December when it was due to reconvene to discuss the 1994 budget. Even though Callejas originally said the office would be in operation by January 1994, it seemed more likely that the next administration, to assume power on January 27, would oversee its implementation.

The Ad Hoc Commission failed to deal directly with the issue of military control over the police force (FUSEP), the fourth branch of the armed forces since 1965. Instead of recommending a transfer into civilian hands, as many hoped the commission would, it created a National Study and Advisory Group to consider the matter. The group was intended to evaluate the police force and design a professionalization program. There were no indications that the group-created in April but unable to produce any findings as of mid-November-had been diligent in fulfilling its mandate.

The commission acknowledged the institutional weakness, inefficiency, and corruption of the criminal justice system asfundamental obstacles to the rule of law in Honduras. An inventory of all pending court cases was recommended to ensure that cases were processed expeditiously, as was the immediate creation of a judicial honor committee to investigate corruption. A new judicial code of ethics, to be binding on all judges, was written and approved by the Supreme Court.

One of the structural reasons why military human rights violators had almost never been punished was the practice by military courts of claiming jurisdiction over all such cases, although the Honduran Constitution seemed to establish that human rights violations, or crimes in which the victim was a civilian, should be the domain of the regular court system. Military courts gave benevolent treatment to members of their own ranks accused of violating citizens' rights. The commission's recommendations on the matter supported the notion that human rights violations should be tried in civilian courts. The commission suggested that the Supreme Court settle all cases of jurisdictional conflict within sixty days. In response to this recommendation, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of civilian jurisdiction after two years of inaction in a case known as the El Astillero massacre. With the transfer of jurisdiction, a colonel arrested and as of November was awaiting trial.

On March 25, Congress reinterpreted Article 90 of the constitution to limit military jurisdiction to prosecutions of "strictly military" crimes committed by armed forces personnel on active duty. It further held that cases where jurisdiction was unclear be automatically turned over to a civilian court. Although many hailed the interpretation as a definitive settlement of the conflict, it provided convenient loopholes for the military to claim jurisdiction in human rights cases by arguing that a soldier or officer was on active duty at the time of the crime and that the crime committed fell under the military code.

One positive development was the activity of the National Human Rights Commission, created by presidential decree in June 1992. While lacking adequate funds and unequivocal government support, the commission played an important role in its first year in providing Hondurans with a place to denounce violations. The commission was established to "work towards the respect for human rights by the State and individuals; give immediate attention and follow-up on any denunciation of human rights violations; elaborate and propose preventive and development programs on human rights, on judicial, education, cultural, and other aspects; and ensure compliance with international conventions and accords ratified by Honduras and promote the adoption of other similar instruments [to

protect human rights]."

Human rights issues played an important, albeit polemical, role in the election campaign leading up to the November 28 general elections. Both major parties indulged in mutual accusations of responsibility for the disappearances in the early 1980s in a manner which human rights organizations felt trivialized the issue. In August, the candidates agreed to eliminate the issue from theircampaigns in an accord negotiated by Archbishop Oscar Andrés Rodríguez. Although proposals by human rights groups for a Truth Commission to conduct a thorough study of the disappearances were rejected by the President, National Human Rights Commissioner Leo Valladares offered to produce a report on the disappeared by December 31, 1993.

The national security doctrine which governed Honduras throughout the 1980s continued to come under reevaluation. Over 150 leftist exiles had returned to their home since Callejas decreed an amnesty in 1990. Among the exiles returned over the past three years were former members of clandestine armed groups as well as members of the peaceful opposition who fled the repression of the 1980s. Clandestine political organizations and parties, subject to repression throughout the past decade, were seeking to enter mainstream politics.

Contrary to statements in August by U.S. Army Gen. Hugh F. Scruggs-in Honduras for joint U.S.-Honduran army exercises-that there remained a "latent" threat of subversion in Honduras, armed leftist groups had little presence in the country. There were two minuscule groups considered to be still active: the Morazanista Patriotic Front and a radical splinter group of the Cinchoneros. Analysts concurred that these groups had scarce material and human resources and posed virtually no threat to the established regime.

Despite the government's increased rhetorical attention to human rights and the conviction in the Martínez case, security forces continued to commit gross human rights violations with impunity, especially in rural areas. While political violence significantly diminished, the military, including FUSEP, were accustomed to settling economic and personal differences with violence. Abusers were rarely held accountable, "punished" most often with a transfer to another area where they continued to violate citizens' rights.

In one particularly egregious case, José Reina Aguilar was shot to death in the middle of Las Lajas, Comayagua, on January 27 by a patrol composed of fifteen to twenty members of the FUSEP, who later claimed they had orders to disarm him. His son-in-law, Roberto Girón, witnessed the crime. The extrajudicial execution may have been a reprisal; Reina Aguilar was apparently a suspect in the murder of a FUSEP sergeant in 1992. Although the execution was witnessed by many, few were willing to testify for fear of retaliation from the four permanent FUSEP police who, Girón claimed "do whatever they want" in town.

Reports of torture and mistreatment while in police custody continued. José Efraín Orellano García told Americas Watch that he was arrested by two police officers in San Juan Pueblo, Atlántida, for no apparent reason on February 28. He was held in a cell for twenty-four hours, during which time he was beaten, kicked while lying on the ground, doused with water, and released only after paying a 300-lempira ($50) "fine." Complaints filed with the FUSEP's office of professional responsibility and in the courts led nowhere.

Forced recruitment by the army was often a brutal, discriminatory practice which disproportionaly affected the poor in rural areas. Bystanders got caught in violent episodes in which army soldiers used fatal force to recruit young men. On March 6 in La Cumbre de La Masica, José Roberto Romero was having a drink at a street stand when three FUSEP agents apparently attempted to recruit him. When Romero tried to escape, the police shot him in the lower right abdomen. He was in the hospital for six days and was rendered unable to work.

In a case which achieved widespread notoriety, eighteen-year-old Glenda Patricia Solórzano was shot to death on May 21 as she traveled in a bus near La Balsa, Olancho. Soldiers from the 15th Infantry Battalion were attempting forcibly to recruit a young man who had managed to get off the bus. He was running behind the moving bus when the soldiers fired two shots which missed him, shattered the two back windows, and killed Solórzano. Three others were injured. This last incident occurred only days after the armed forces chief, Gen. Luis Alonso Discua Elvir, temporarily suspended recruitment until after the elections, as mandated by law.

The Right to Monitor

Monitors in Honduras were accustomed to phone tapping and occasional vigilance, which were common. In addition, there were sporadic efforts to discredit or threaten human rights groups. In January, a so-called Group of Four, claiming to be the "armed wing" of the human rights organization Codeh, took responsibility for a bomb which destroyed the car belonging to two sons of the former armed forces chief, retired Gen. Humberto Regalado Hernández. At the time of the explosion, the car was parked near Codeh's San Pedro Sula office while the two sons apparently shopped in a nearby store. Codeh president Dr. Ramón Custodio publicly denied any relationship to the incident or the group.

In February, Human Rights Commissioner Valladares received strong verbal pressures from armed forces chief Discua to discontinue his work, which Discua found damaging to the army's prestige.

U.S. Policy

For ten years, successive U.S. administrations provided Honduras with massive military aid designed to mold it into a bulwark against the perceived communist threat in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala. Part of that policy was the systematic whitewashing of the Honduran military's human rights record. With the end of the Cold War, the U.S. began to exert more pressure on the Honduran armed forces to end human rights abuses and reduce their quota of power. Ambassador Arcos left in mid-1993 with an impressive record of human rights advocacy from the U.S. Embassy, pressure which was particularly important in the Martínez case.

Military aid to Honduras declined after 1990, although foreign military sales by the U.S. government remained relatively high. The U.S. provided an estimated $1.5 million in military aid toHonduras in fiscal year 1993 and spent $1.1 million training the army. In addition, the administration provided approximately $9.7 million in Economic Support Funds (ESF), cash payments to the Callejas government. The Clinton administration requested similar levels of military aid for fiscal year 1994, but only $7.5 million in ESF. Foreign military sales agreements worth $10 million were reached in fiscal year 1993 and a similar level was expected to be approved in fiscal year 1994. Americas Watch urged the administration to use its remaining security assistance program, and other sources of influence, as a lever for human rights improvements, including the total separation of the police from the military, and prosecution of those responsible for human rights violations.

The 1992 State Department Country Report on Human Rights Practices, for Honduras, although far from exhaustive, directly implicated the armed forces in human rights abuses. The report cited "the tendency of [armed forces] personnel to protect officers accused of abuses; the inability of civilians to levy formal accusations before military courts; ill-trained and poorly equipped judiciary and police forces; and an endemically corrupt and inefficient criminal justice system" as obstacles to overcoming military impunity. The State Department asserted that a fundamental problem was "the failure of the Supreme Court to render decisions about the jurisdiction of the civilian courts over [armed forces] personnel accused of offenses involving civilians."

In July 1993, William Pryce, a Latin America specialist on the National Security Council during the Bush administration, became the new U.S. ambassador in Honduras. Pryce told Americas Watch that human rights were a pivotal aspect of U.S. policy of promoting democracy in Honduras. It was unclear, however, whether the new ambassador would use his position of considerable weight to pressure the Honduran government as his predecessor did.

The Work of Americas Watch

The unprecedented reform efforts underway in Honduras during 1992 and 1993 warranted new research by Americas Watch to evaluate the evolving human rights situation. Two Americas Watch researchers conducted a fact-finding mission in October 1993, taking testimony from victims and witnesses of human rights violations and holding meetings with the national human rights commissioner, a member of the Ad Hoc Commission, the U.S. ambassador, and human rights organizations.

During the meeting of the General Assembly of the Organization of American States in Managua in June, Americas Watch and the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL) publicized Honduras's failure to comply fully with the decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights holding the government responsible for the disappearance of Manfredo Angel Velásquez in 1981 and Saúl Godínez Cruz in 1982. Although the court in August 1990 adjusted the amount of damages that Honduras owed to the victims' families to compensate for Honduras's delinquent payment, the Callejasgovernment still failed to compensate the families in accordance with the court's ruling. Americas Watch and CEJIL continued in 1993 to press members of the U.S. Congress to make full compliance with the court's verdict a condition to receive U.S. security assistance.