Honduras

Honduras is a country with around 9 million inhabitants. More than 50% of the population is younger than 26 years old. Honduras has two large cities; Tegucigalpa, the capital, and San Pedro Sula in the northern region of the country. Honduras is located in Central America and is bordered by Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala. It is surrounded by two oceans; in the north is the Caribbean Sea, and the Golf of Fonseca in the South Pacific. Honduras is one of the poorest countries in Latin America and has one of the highest murder rates in the world. Poverty is more prevalent in the rural and indigenous parts of the country.

In November 2017, Juan Orlando Hernandez from the Partido Nacional won the presidential election. However, due to lack of fairness and transparency, the elections and their results were questioned. The next presidential elections will be held at the end of 2021.

Taking into account human rights, Honduras presents a difficult case. Illegal or arbitrary executions, including extrajudicial executions, torture, cruel, inhumane, and degrading punishment, harsh and life-threatening prison conditions, arbitrary detention or arrest, murders and threats against media communication by criminal organizations, defamation, severe acts of corruption, including among officials of high authority, lack of investigation and bookkeeping on gender-based violence, discrimination and violence against indigenous, afro-descendants and those who identify as LGBTQIA+ are all present in the country.

The organized crime groups, including local and transnational gangs and narcotics traffickers, are the perpetrators of violent crimes such as homicide, torture, kidnapping, extortion, human trafficking, intimidation, and violent threats against human rights defenders, judicial authorities, lawyers, members of the business community, journalists, bloggers, women, and other vulnerable populations. The government investigated and processed many of these crimes, particularly through the working group on Violent Crime of the national police.

People in Need in Honduras: 2017 – 2022

Since 2017, People in Need (PIN) has been supporting civil society in Honduras through trainings for women, youth, farmers, indigenous people, and LGBTQIA+ groups. These trainings focus on improving organizations to increase their capacity. Another line of PIN´s work in Honduras involves supporting human rights defenders and human rights organizations. PIN also helped produce radio programs and the distribution of audiovisual material documenting human rights violations in Honduras. On-the-ground defense and strengthening indigenous groups in their fight for human rights are also important themes for People in Need.