Honduras MCC Program Not Renewed

The AP reported yesterday afternoon that the US decided this week not to renew a $215 million Millennium Challenge Corporation aid program for Honduras. According to the AP, the program trained 17,000 farmers, created 31,396 rural jobs and improved a key highway and 500 kilometers (310 miles) of rural roads in Honduras. The US Embassy in Tegucigalpa offered no explanation for the non-renewal but Honduran officials claim the cuts were due to corruption under the government of ousted former president Manuel Zelaya. Maria Guillen, Lobo's chief Cabinet minister:

“We lament this decision because it was based on an evaluation of the perception of corruption levels in the country. And it affects the people the most.”

Guillen went on to say such high levels of corruption were detected in 2007, 2008, and 2009. Foreign Minister Mario Canahuati too said he blamed “the previous government” and said the government he now works for is paying the price. Canhuati: “Now Lobo has to take on this burden (even though) he acted transparently.” But again, no word from the US embassy or MCC saying anything about corruption or Zelaya. To the contrary, the US embassy, writes the AP, called the implementation of the Millennium program in Honduras a success and one of the “best in the world.” Honduras Culture and Politics adds, the MCC, in its statement about the non-renewal says the following:

“MCC recognizes the positive steps taken by the Government of Honduras, as well as its strong commitment to reform and reconciliation. We look forward to continued engagement with the Government of Honduras and future consideration of the country for a second compact.”

Also, on Honduras from Honduras Culture and Politics, a review of two new and interesting Honduras cables from June 18 and 19, 2009, published by France’s Le Monde. The actual cables aren’t posted yet, but according to the Le Monde (thanks to HCP’s translations), on June 18, eleven days before the ouster of Zelaya, US ambassador Hugo Llorens maintained that Honduran military leaders had no intention of attacking the “legitimate government” of then-President Zelaya. Llorens had chatted with General Romeo Vasquez over breakfast that day and received assurances from Vasquez that the Honduran military would “not do anything without the support of the American administration.” One day later, however, Llorens reported that the country may be headed for a “major political confrontation,” despite Llorens writing that there was “no information suggesting that Zelaya or a member of his government intend to trample democracy and suspend constitutional guarantees.”

In other early morning stories:

· The AP reports on the attack of a minibus in the eastern Honduran province of Olancho yesterday. The attack killed 8 and injured at least 3 others. It follows a similar attack in neighboring Guatemala which killed 6.

· ContraPunto with more crime statistics from 2010, writing that its tabulation of homicide rates put Honduras and El Salvador among the most violent countries in the world in last year. The former registered 72.8 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants; the latter 71 per 100,000. Venezuela was third on the list followed by Colombia and then Mexico.

· In Venezuela, EFE reports on the (re)arrest of another high-profile narcotrafficker, Larry Trovar Acuna in the coastal city of Maracay. Trovar was sentenced in 1988 to 13 years in prison for his connections to Colombia’s Medellin cartel but went free in 1993. He was re-arrested in 2002 in Venezuela and sentenced a year later to 15 years. But again was released in 2003. His most recent detainment comes after allegedly shooting at Venezuelan police officers.

· Central American Politics has a recent round-up on the state of siege still in effect in Guatemala’s Alta Verapaz province. As of two days ago, the Guatemalan government had reported the arrest of 22 alleged narcos, the confiscation of 5 small planes, over 200 assault weapons, and nearly 30 vehicles. According to Al-Jazeera’s reporting, there is growing skepticism among many social organizations in the region about the motivations behind the government’s crackdown. Carlos Morales, who works for farmers' rights with the Union of Campiseno Organisations of Verapaz:

“The state of siege is a strategy of the government to attack social movements. There are agrarian conflicts in much of Alta Verapaz…The government is trying to silence groups organizing for land reform and against mega-projects like hydro-electric dams and palm oil plantations.”

· Earlier in the week, Peru’s La Republica reported on trafficking activities (since the 1990s) of two groups connected to Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel along the Peru-Ecuador border.

· At Just the Facts, WOLA’s Adam Isacson with analysis of Rio’s Favela Pacification Program after a recent visit to the city.

· With another side of Brazil, the Economist reports this week on the country’s rapid development in the area of scientific research. The Economist:

“Brazil is no longer a scientific also-ran. It produces half a million graduates and 10,000 PhDs a year, ten times more than two decades ago. Between 2002 and 2008 its share of the world’s scientific papers rose from 1.7% to 2.7%. It is a world leader in research on tropical medicine, bioenergy and plant biology. It spends 1% of its fast-growing GDP on research, half the rich-world share but almost double the average in the rest of Latin America. Its scientists are increasingly collaborating with those abroad: 30% of scientific papers by Brazilians now have a foreign co-author.”

· Meanwhile, Spain’s El País discusses the launch of Dilma Rousseff’s first new anti-poverty program– the Program of Growth Acceleration (PAC) against Misery. The program is an expansion of an earlier initiative she directed in Lula’s government. The difference being the program’s specific target – extreme poverty – through new job creation and the expansion of social services and benefits. And in the Estado de Sao Paulo, Paolo Sotero of the Wilson Center with more on the topic of Dilma Rousseff and human rights, as discussed here yesterday.

· US Ass’t. Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Arturo Valenzuela, called Venezuela’s recently approved “Enabling Law” an “antidemocratic measure” that violates the OAS’s Inter-American Charter.

· In the January Spanish edition of Le Monde Diplomatique, an interview with Rafael Correa about the coup-attempt of Sept. 30, 2010.

· El Faro reports that Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes has returned legislation on a new freedom of information law to the National Assembly for revision, saying it would be impossible to implement the law in 30 days, as the original legislation stipulates. Instead, he’s asking for at least 12 months.

· And finally, in The Nation, the National Security Archive’s Peter Kornbluh on the upcoming trial of Cuban terrorist, Luis Posada Carriles – set to begin next week in El Paso, Texas. The twist, according to Kornbluh: “The man identified by US intelligence reports as a mastermind of the midair destruction of a Cuban airliner—all seventy-three people on board were killed when the plane plunged into the sea off the coast of Barbados on October 6, 1976—and who publicly bragged about being behind a series of hotel bombings in Havana that killed an Italian businessman, Fabio Di Celmo, is being prosecuted for perjury and fraud, not murder and mayhem.