RIGHTS: Honduras Rights Commissioner Urges U.S. Cooperation

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Jan 28 1998 (IPS) - The National Commissioner for Human Rights of Honduras wants U.S. President Bill Clinton to follow through on his commitment to hand over records that could shed light on the “disappearance” of nearly 200 people in the 1980s.

In a report released here and in Tegucigalpa, Commissioner Leo Valladares complains that the response by key U.S. agencies whose cooperation is vital to providing a record of serious abuses committed during that era has been “exceedingly frustrating.”

While the State Department has turned over hundreds of documents – many irrelevant to Valladares’ quest – the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) have been less forthcoming, according to the report ‘The Search of Hidden Truths.’

A similar pattern of foot-dragging on the part of the latter two agencies also has occurred in the release of previously classified information on their activities in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Haiti, say intelligence experts. In recent years, reports have been confirmned that these agencies were much more involved with the repressive apparatus of these countries, as well as Honduras, than previously was admitted.

In addition, Argentina – whose military government played a key role in exporting its “dirty war” methods to Honduras in the early 1980s – has not been as helpful as Valladares had hoped, says the 217-page report, published in both English and Spanish.

The focus of Valladares’ work, begun in 1993, involves serious rights abuses committed in Honduras in the early 1980s. At that time, administration of President Ronald Reagan, supported by Argentina’s military junta, launched a major military and intelligence buildup to contain and overturn the Sandinista government in Nicaragua and defeat the leftist insurgency in El Salvador.

Operating under the protection of the right-wing military commander-in-chief of Honduras, Gen. Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, the Reagan administration transformed much of the country into what was labelled the “U.S.S. Honduras.” Honduras territory was used as a rear base for the training and supply of the Nicaraguan contras in the south, and for the projection of U.S. military power and covert operations throughout Central America during the 1980s.

Alvarez, who was ousted in a barracks coup in 1984, engineered the creation of “Battalion 3-16”, a military intelligence unit that acted as a state-run death squad, according to published reports and testimony by Battalion veterans. The unit was first trained by Argentine personnel and then CIA operatives.

Financed by the CIA, the Battalion was responsible for the capture, torture and disappearance of dozens of students, labour activists, grass-roots leaders, journalists, and other suspected dissidents.

Washington, including its ambassador during most of this period, John Negroponte, staunchly defended the military against charges by international and local human rights groups, often denying that abuses were taking place or were attributable to the army. Negroponte later was appointed ambassador to the Philippines and then Mexico.

Most of the records kept by the Honduran army itself during the years of repression have been destroyed, according to the new report. There are no laws regarding the preservation of state records nor, as under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, any way for citizens to gain access to such documents.

As a result, Valladares has been forced to rely on Argentina and the United States for documentary evidence that would help him in clarifying what abuses took place and who was responsible.

He has sought documents from six U.S. agencies, including the State Department, the National Security Council, the CIA, and three agencies within the Department of Defence. His requests have been backed up by resolutions approved by both houses of the U.S. Congress and editorials in national newspapers, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Miami Herald.

The State Department declassified more than 2,500 pages of cables and memoranda, many of which had already been released as a result of requests by major newspapers and the family of Father James Carney, a U.S. priest who disappeared in Olancho province in Sep. 1983 while he was reportedly accompanying a small guerrilla column.

While the information contained in these documents included useful background, they revealed little that was not already known publicly, according to the new report.

The CIA has released two batches of documents totalling about 500 pages on Father Carney and five other specific human rights cases. Valladares, however, charges that the documents have been “excessively excised” and that “they contain more information on the organisation and activities of leftist groups in Honduras” than about abuses committed by the armed forces.

Despite written pledges to U.S. lawmakers – most recently last month – that the CIA would comply with Honduras’ requests for all information on Gen. Alvarez and Battalion 3-16 by the end of 1997, the documents still have not been declassified and turned over.

Valladares is especially eager to get hold of a 1997 report by the CIA Inspector General on the agency’s relationship to the Honduran military – which Clinton also pledged to turn over by the end of 1997.

CIA spokeswoman Anya Guilsher told IPS that the agency was working “diligently” on the requests and added that information relevant to Gen. Alvarez “should be out shortly.”

Of all the U.S. agencies, the Pentagon, which retains close ties with the Honduran military, has been the “least forthcoming,” according to Valladares. In an Oct. 1996 letter to Valladares, the Defence Department said it had located 260 boxes of documents covering the relevant period.

Of this amount, it delivered 34 documents – most of whose contents were blacked out by Defence Department censors allegedly to protect intelligence “sources and methods.” Sources say the Pentagon transferred another 200 documents to the State Department last month for transmission to Valladares. A spokesman said Wednesday no additional searches are contemplated.