From left to right: US Ambassador Hugo Llorens, David Johnson, and Honduran Security Minister, Oscar Álvarez
David Johnson (R), U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, and Hugo Llorens, U.S Ambassador to Honduras, attend a news conference after a meeting with Honduras' President Porfirio Lobo at the presidential house in Tegucigalpa October 21, 2010. Johnson is on an official visit to Honduras to discuss efforts to combat narcotics trafficking. Photo Source: Reuters
by OFRANEH (Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras)
The announcement made by Security Minister, Mr. Oscar Álvarez, of requesting a Plan Colombia for Honduras (1) is a component of the campaign undertaken by Mrs. Hillary Clinton to intensify militarization in the continent with the alleged purpose of stopping drug trafficking towards the United States.
At the start of September this year, Mrs. Clinton pointed out that the United States seeks to implement a Plan Colombia for Mexico and Central America (2). Despite acknowledging the controversy caused by this US initiative, the person in charge of foreign policy for the Obama Administration insists in pressuring so that Central America and Mexico facilitate the militarization that will be entailed by Plan Colombia.
In the face of the imminent arrival to Honduras of Mr. David Johnson, US Sub Secretary of State for Antidrug Fighting, Minister Álvarez echoes the Clinton strategy for the continent. However, as it is a custom of the State Department, a root cause analysis of the problem is avoided to be carried out, allowing the media circus surrounding drugs, avoiding to touch the heart of the current violence crisis and the absence of governance taking place in Honduras and in neighbouring countries.
It is unbelievable that with all the technology and financial resources owned by the United States, they have been uncapable of controlling the drug problem. To start, the great drug market in the cities of rich countries persists to date besides the fact that they don't only credit the greatest number of consumers, but that at the same time they produce the indispensable chemical precursors and their financial entities have been in charge for decades of the laundering of thousands of millions of dollars. To make matters worse, the United States are the source of firearms of all sorts of caliber, from which the criminal organizations supply themselves.
"Organized crime, money laundering, and corruption are a global threat", denounces Antonio María Costa, executive director of the Office Against Drug and Crime of the United Nations (UNDOC) with headquearters in Vienna, before the United Nations General Assembly (3). Last year, Mr. Costa pointed out how the banks laundered during the financial crisis US$ 352 thousand million, establishing the bills originated from drug trafficking as the only liquid capital obtainable by banking institutions in danger of collapse (4). In addition to Mr. Acosta's indications, the United Nations Office against Drugs and Crime (ONUDD) reports that organized crime generates 119 thousand million dollars, making drug trafficking one of the most lucrative businesses on the planet (5).
The information offered by UNDOC and ONUDD about the profit of organized crime make us think that without the support of the banks and their tax havens, including the cooperation of corrupt officials, drug trafficking, and other forms of organized crime wouldn't exist.
The war on drug trafficking should take place in a financial level, disarticulating the existing complicity to pursue the bank secrets and the tax havens; much more than persisting in the obsolete tendency towards a futile war, that in spite of the enormous financial and human investment, after over thirty years has not otherwise than led towards a proliferation of addicts and unnecessary victims.
In Honduras, the legal reform provided by Article 49 of the Draft Bill for the Law of Modernization of the Tax, Custom, and Anti-Evasion System proposed by the Finance Secretariat to the Legislative Power has caused bitterness among the power elite. In other words, the oligarchy feels threatened by any initiative of control of the banking secret and money laundering taking place in the country.
Notwithstanding the failure of the War on Drugs, the same strategy continues with a secret agenda which goes beyond stopping drug trafficking and refers to consolidating the political-military control of the continent.
The role assumed by the main drug consumer on the planet, the United States, as a judge in matters of certifying which are the countries that supposedly fight or not drug trafficking is part of a tragicomedy of global dominance in hands of the empire.
A classic example of this is Afghanistan, where in spite of being invaded by the United States and NATO, opium and heroin production has intensified during the last decade. Something similar happens with Plan Colombia, since Plan Colombia never stopped coca production but did intensify the internal war of that country, which counts with four million Colombians transferred within its frontiers and millions ousted.
Plan Colombia or Merida Initiative for Honduras will certainly have an increase in violations of the already threatened human rights of Hondurans; situation which worsened with the coup d'état perpetrated last year in Honduras.
Our country survives one of the biggest political and economic crises in its history, situation which some intend to ignore, whitewashing a bloody reality, with the aim of personal profit associating the local power elite and the satraps on duty with the empire's interests.
A report issued by the questionable Honduran Human Rights Commisionate(CONADEH) on October 19, indicates that Honduras is the homicide world champion (66,8 for every 100,000 inhabitants, with 286 murders per month), revealing also that since the coup violence has escalated in Honduras. The report also points out the erratic policies of the Security Ministry (6). Of course that the Security Minister, Mr. Álvarez, uses very adequate excuses to proliferate repression: drug trafficking and youth gangs better known as "maras".
A Plan Colombia for Honduras is a sordid signal of danger for our people, who has suffered a constant plunder of natural resources of the country and is subdued to the ignominy of migration to the North as an only economic way out of poverty, which is seen by the majority of the Honduran population as a viable exit.
What is missing is that Mrs. Clinton gives green light to increase the budget for the ministries implicated in human rights violations, all in the name of supposedly stopping drug trafficking. In the meantime, the United States continue using drugs as an instrument fo social control and as an excuse to occupy us militarily.
(1)http://www.laprensa.hn/Apertura/Ediciones/2010/10/19/Noticias/Honduras-pide-a-EUA-un-Plan-Colombia
(2) http://www.excelsior.com.mx/index.php?m=nota&id_nota=659311
(3) http://informe21.com/actualidad/crimen-organizado-lavado-dinero-corrupcion-son-amenaza-global-advierte-naciones-unidas
(4) http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/2009/dec/13/drug-money-banks-saved-un-cfief-claims
(5) http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2010/10/19index.phpsection=politica&article=010n1pol
(6)http://www.elheraldo.hn/Ediciones/2010/10/19/Noticias/Honduras-286-personas-al-mes-mueren-violentamente
La Ceiba, Atlántida 21 de Octubre del 2010
Organización Fraternal Negra Hondureña, OFRANEH
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