{"id":8831,"date":"2024-09-03T07:28:38","date_gmt":"2024-09-03T11:28:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=8831"},"modified":"2024-09-03T07:28:38","modified_gmt":"2024-09-03T11:28:38","slug":"hondurans-disillusioned-with-leader-amid-scandal-and-end-to-u-s-extradition-treaty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=8831","title":{"rendered":"Hondurans Disillusioned with Leader Amid Scandal and End to U.S. Extradition Treaty"},"content":{"rendered":"
Honduras\u2019 President Xiomara Castro waves during the swearing-in ceremony for Colombia\u2019s President Gustavo Petro in Bogota, Colombia, Aug. 7, 2022. (AP Photo\/Fernando Vergara, File)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

An incriminating admission by the brother-in-law of Honduras\u2019 president just days after the country announced it would end its longstanding extradition treaty with the U.S. is feeding fears among Hondurans that the country\u2019s legacy of corruption is continuing.<\/p>\n

President Xiomara Castro had inspired hope when she was elected the Central American nation\u2019s first female leader in 2021 on a promise to \u201cpull Honduras out of the abyss we have been buried in by neoliberalism, a narco-dictator and corruption.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite being married to former President Manuel Zelaya Rosales \u2013 ousted in a coup in 2009 \u2013 she was a breath of fresh air for many Hondurans after the presidency of Juan Orlando Hern\u00e1ndez, who in June was sentenced to 45 years in prison<\/a><\/span> by a U.S. federal court for drug trafficking.<\/p>\n

But as gang violence has continued to roil Honduras<\/a><\/span> and several scandals have plagued Castro\u2019s government, frustration has replaced that initial optimism for many Hondurans who now see her as the same brand of corrupt leader that has long ruled their country.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe thought that corruption would end with Xiomara Castro, because they were supposed to be different from previous governments, but they have turned out to be the same or worse,\u201d said 44-year-old Gabriel Hern\u00e1ndez, who works in marketing in the capital, Tegucigalpa.<\/p>\n

The latest blow came this weekend, when Castro\u2019s brother-in-law, Carlos Zelaya, part of Libre\u2019s leadership team in the Congress, admitted that he had met with a leader of the drug trafficking organization \u201cLos Cachiros\u201d in 2013.<\/p>\n

Zelaya, brother of the former president, revealed the details to the press when he went to the Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office on Saturday to give a statement related to an investigation into his alleged links to drug trafficking.<\/p>\n

He said the drug trafficker offered support to Libre\u2019s campaign that year, when Castro made a failed first bid for the presidency. Zelaya explained that at the time, he did not know that people in the meeting were linked with drug trafficking.<\/p>\n

\u201cEleven years ago I was invited to participate in a meeting in which there was a group of businessmen who wanted to make a contribution to the campaign,\u201d Zelaya said as he left the Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office. \u201cI am convinced that that meeting and everything that happened there was recorded. I fell into a trap, I assume my responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

His admission came just days after Castro\u2019s foreign affairs minister announced Honduras was ending an extradition treaty with the United States following a spat with an American diplomat. The treaty had been in place for over a century and since 2014, 64 Hondurans have been extradited to the U.S., largely on drug trafficking charges. Among those was former president Hern\u00e1ndez.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think this is a coincidence, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s random … This is an issue that could be a turning point in Castro\u2019s presidency,\u201d Breda said. \u201cUnless Castro steps back and reestablishes the extradition treaty, this move will inevitably be seen as a way to protect their family.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those suspicions were shared by Hondurans like Hern\u00e1ndez, the marketing worker, who said that even an \u201cordinary person like me\u201d knows that it was not a coincidence.<\/p>\n

The discontent may be a major political burden for Castro and her Liberty and Refoundation Party (Libre) in the lead up to next year\u2019s elections, said Tiziano Breda, a Central America expert at Italy\u2019s Instituto Affari Internazionali. The recent moves by the government \u201cweaken the argument that brought Libre to power, which was basically to kick out the corrupt elite that was in cahoots with drug trafficking organizations,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The frustrations among Hondurans coincide with sliding approval numbers for the president. Compounding that discontent is also unemployment, economic turmoil and failures to reduce the level of violence.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s common for politicians to play these kinds of games, looking for ways to escape justice, not be accountable to the people, to hide their misdeeds and thus continue their legacy of corruption, which ultimately never ends,\u201d marketer Hern\u00e1ndez said.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the first time Castro has faced criticism for perceived corruption.<\/p>\n

Last year, the director of a Honduran anti-corruption organization fled the country<\/a><\/span> with her family over threats she received after publishing a report on nepotism in the Castro administration. The organization had warned of a \u201cconcentration of power\u201d from government posts going to the children and other relatives of Castro and her husband, the former president.<\/p>\n

Carlos Zelaya\u2019s announcement was followed by another from his son, Honduras Defense Minister Jos\u00e9 Manuel Zelaya Rosales, who tendered his resignation in an effort to ensure no favoritism would be shown to his father.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, Castro announced that Zelaya Rosales, her nephew, would be replaced as defense minister by presidential hopeful Rixi Moncada Godoy.<\/p>\n

Moncada Godoy will \u201craise our flag high and remind us that our true value lies in dignified, strong and determined people who forge their own destinies,\u201d Castro said.<\/p>\n

– Marlon Gonz\u00e1lez and Megan Janetsky, AP News<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An incriminating admission by the brother-in-law of Honduras\u2019 president just days after the country announced it would end its longstanding extradition treaty with the U.S. is feeding fears among Hondurans that the country\u2019s legacy of corruption is continuing. President Xiomara Castro had inspired hope when she was elected the Central American nation\u2019s first female leader…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":8833,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dims.apnews.com\/dims4\/default\/401462d\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/2453x1633+0+1\/resize\/820x546!\/format\/webp\/quality\/90\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.apnews.com%2F25%2Ff1%2F46306bba48ffcf1c85354f169f45%2Ff734f164005e4691ab68f82d2e593717","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-polity-governance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8831"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8831\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8834,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8831\/revisions\/8834"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}