Call to Action for the International Community

Below is a letter received from one of our Honduran colleagues asking for support to end human rights violations in the country.  As she describes, the situation is worsening. Please visit our action page now to send a letter to President Obama. Thank you.

By Wendy Cruz

I call on the International Community to denounce the critical situation that thousands of women and men in Honduras are living in El Paraíso. Our brothers and sisters are in the streets, wet, without food or water. Police roadblocks and members of the national army are nearby. People cannot pass the blockades or return to Tegucigalpa because the de facto government of Roberto Michelleti decreed a 24-hour curfew in the departments of Choluteca and Paraiso.

We urge all human rights organizations and activists to act now in solidarity. It should not be acceptable to make us prisoners in our own country. We ask you to do something because the lives of many of our colleagues are in real danger. They cannot move anywhere because if they do so, the military will arrest them. We disagree with this coup and we are in eminent danger due to the measures placed on us by the country’s oligarchy which continues to grow even stricter.

I also urge you to denounce CNN, for it is giving the world the impression that everything is at peace in our country. This cannot be true while many of our brothers and sisters are living without water, food, and clothing—they are trying to pull the wool over people’s eyes…. Be assured that we, as Honduran men and women, will continue to stand, and will never kneel before the de facto government of Roberto Michelleti, even if it were to cost us our lives.

Today, more than ever, we need International solidarity to reinstall democracy in our country.

Wendy Cruz is a technical advisor for the Via Campesina – Central America.