DAY 46: Political Prisoners, Elections and the Continuing Resistance

Tegucigalpa, Aug 14 (Prensa Latina) The popular resistance against the June 28 military coup in Honduras has reached Friday its 48th day of resistance, and its leader will continue rallying until the restitution of the constitutional order.

Honduras: 24 Political Prisoners Denounced
viernes, 14 de agosto de 2009

Tegucigalpa, Aug 14 (Prensa Latina) The Honduran National Front against the Coup denounced the existence of the first 24 political prisoners of the coupist government headed by entrepreneur Roberto Micheletti.

In a communique The National Front said these people were arrested two days ago around the Congress building, after they were brutally beaten and injured by the police.

The communique added they were accused of stealing, sedition and damage to private and public property, among other crimes, in an illegal audience without being put to the disposal of the Public Ministry.

Among these people is agronomist and actress Alba Leticias Ochoa, who was seen in a film when she was brutally beaten and kicked by police agents.

Honduran Deputy Silvia Ayala, from the Unificacion Democratica Party, condemned the use of justice by their own hands and that prosecutors become inactive before the real attackers.

“No Future Predicted for Honduras Elections
Escrito por Elsy Fors Garzon
viernes, 14 de agosto de 2009

Tegucigalpa, Aug 14 (Prensa Latina) The Honduras political crisis puts in jeopardy the general elections foreseen for the end of this year, which will lack future without the restoration of the constitutional order, sentences today local daily Tiempo.

By the way events are developing, “what is in risk for the moment is the election process that definitely has no future if at least the constitutional order is not restored,” says the newspaper.

While normalization of the state of law keeps being postponed, also there will be “a severe deterioration of the certainty there will be general elections,” summoned for next November 29, alerts the editorial.

The Roberto Micheletti regime, it recalls, maintains its denial to accept the so-called San Jose Agreement, that is, the plan presented by Costa Rica president Oscar Arias, as mediator in the conflict unleashed here after the military coup of June 28.

According to Tiempo, the coupists seem to be ready to maintain that stand until “a few days before general elections.”

In such conditions, adds the analysis, “what citizenry would reclaim is the calling for a constituent assembly and, thus, really solve the political crisis and set the constitutional bases for national reconciliation.”

If the forecast results true, the final effect of the coup dÂ�Etat would be “completely contrary to its main objective” in order to prevent the practice of citizensÂ�will, considers the editorial.

The military coup occurred the same day in whiuch the government of president Manuel Zelaya would apply a survey to know if the people supported the consultation at the polls to convoke the Constituent Assembly and make up a new Great Charter, explains the paper.

Based on the coup, it sentences, the political institutions in this Central American nation suffer “a collapse.”

This time, ponders Tiempo daily, “it has nothing to do as in other occasions, with the transfer of voters from one party to another, but the abandonement of party affiliation” due to the participation of its leaders in the coup and the direct support to the de facto regime.