Nicaragua Network

WEDNESDAY, JULY 01, 2009

Honduras Action Alert and Media Suggestions!

News Flash! Late Thursday, July 2, the Obama Administration announced it was temporarily suspending some aid programs to the Honduran coup government.

Latin America Solidarity Coalition
Urgent Action Alert
July 1, 2009

US Corporate Media Reporting Badly on Honduras Coup
Write Letter-to-the-Editor to Correct Media Inaccuracies

Your Elected Representatives are Coming Home for the Long Weekend
Tell Them By Law the US Has to Cut Off Aid to the Coup Government!

The corporate media in the US is consistently using language that misinforms US residents about the continuing coup. We encourage you to write letters-to-the editor, call in to radio talk shows, send emails and make calls to the television stations and networks

Secondly, Congress is breaking for the July 4 recess which means Senators and Representatives will be in their home districts and states over the long week-end. Contact district offices and talk to your elected officials at picnics and other holiday events. Tell them that, by violating US law to cut off all aid to governments that come to power through a military coup, the US is undermining the united demand of the rest of the world that elected President Manuel Zelaya be returned to office without conditions.

For an excellent letter from Massachusetts Representative James McGovern to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that you can use with your Representative, go here: rep-mcgovern-letter-honduras.pdf

As we were writing this alert, the Honduran Congress suspended all civil liberties for 24 hours, banned demonstrations and free speech, and allow homes to be entered without a warrant. With President Zelaya declaring that he will return to Honduras on Saturday, time is of the essence to prevent serious bloodshed. The US government, and President Obama specifically, must act now.

Call the State Department, the White House, and your elected representatives and ask for actions, not words, including:

1. Cut off of all US aid (as required by US law) until Zelaya is safely returned to office without conditions.
2. Financial sanctions against the coup plotters
3. An investigation into what signals U.S. Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens gave to coup plotters before the coup.
4. A demand that the civil rights and liberties of the citizens and residents of Honduras be respected, and a reminder that the international community will hold the current regime responsible for violations of human rights.

State Department: 202-647-4000 or 1-800-877-8339
White House: Comments: 202-456-1111
Click here to send a message to President Barack Obama.
Congressional Switchboard 202-224-3121
For District Offices check local listings

Letters-to-the-Editor
Accurate stories are a fundamental responsibility

The US press is replicating several inaccuracies in its accounts of the coup and there is other information they are not including at all. Hold the press accountable to report accurately and fully. Below are talking points that can be used in letters to the editor of your local paper or on blogs or comments on media web pages.

• There is no excuse for this coup. A constitutional crisis came to a head when President Zelaya ordered the military to distribute materials for a non-binding referendum to be held last Sunday. The referendum asked citizens to vote on whether they were in favor of including a proposal for a constituent assembly, to redraft the constitution, on the November ballot. The head of the military, General Romeo Vasquez refused to carry out the President's orders. The president, as commander-in-chief of the military, then fired Vasquez, whereupon the Defense Minister resigned. The Supreme Court subsequently ruled that the president's firing of Vasquez was illegal, and the majority of the Congress has gone against President Zelaya. (This is a quote from an op-ed written by Mark Weisbrot of Center for Economic Policy Research)

• General Vasquez is a two time graduate of the infamous Army School of the Americas in Ft. Benning, GA. He joins a long list of coup plotters and human rights violators trained at the SOA which has been renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

• The referendum was not, as press reports imply, about changing the constitution so Zelaya could run for re-election. His term ends in November and he has stated he intends to serve out his term and then retire to his farm. The referendum was a nonbinding survey asking whether voters would like to have a fourth ballot added to the November election to decide whether or not to call a constituent assembly to re-write the constitution.

• The Honduran oligarchy deposed President Zelaya because he wanted the people to vote. Since when is voting a crime?

• We are getting little corporate press coverage from inside Honduras. Some of what we do get gives the impression that the people support the coup. Unreported are the thousands who've gone into the streets and been violently attacked by the army with many arrested and injured. Buses carrying protesters from other parts of Honduras have not been allowed to enter the capital city of Tegucigalpa.

• Little mention is made that the World Bank and Central America Integration Bank have suspended loans and that Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala, which share borders with Honduras have closed the borders to trade for 48 hours and will “impede trade” if the coup is not reversed by then.

• A prominent feature of every corporate media story is that Zelaya is a friend of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Zelaya also has good relations with Brazilian president Lula da Silva, Chilean president Michelle Bachelet, and other leaders in the region, yet this is rarely mentioned in the major media which prefers to frame the story as a U.S. versus Chavez struggle for influence. Honduras joined the ALBA and Petrocaribe. ALBA is a cooperative trade group initiated by Venezuela and Cuba and joined by Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador and several Caribbean island nations to base trade on cooperation not competition. Petrocaribe allows Honduras to buy Venezuelan oil with preferential payment terms. The right-wing in Latin America and the US corporate media hate Hugo Chavez, but there is nothing wrong with Zelaya making trade agreements that benefit ALL Hondurans. It is misleading to make the Honduran coup about Chavez.

To read previous Honduras action alerts, go here. For a longer background and analysis, read this article from Foreign Policy in Focus.

This action alert comes to you from the Latin America Solidarity Coalition. To keep current with fast-moving events around the coup regularly visit the following web pages: www.lasolidarity.org, www.rightsaction.org, www.soaw.org, www.nicanet.org, www.cispes.org and/or join the Latin America Solidarity Coalition listserve by going here.