Central America
Fists fly in Honduran Congress ahead of new president’s inauguration
AFP
Lawmakers exchanged blows in the Honduran Congress Friday as a dispute among members of president-elect Xiomara Castro’s party turned violent.
Legislators from her leftist Libre party protested after 20 rebel members proposed Jorge Calix, one of their cohorts, as provisional congress president.
Castro loyalists claimed this violated a pact with Libre’s coalition partner.
Amid cries of “traitors” and “Xiomara!”, angry Libre legislators forced their way to the podium while Calix was being sworn in, causing him to flee under a hail of punches and much pushing and shoving.
It was the first sitting of the 128-member Congress since elections last November.
Following an emergency party meeting later on Friday, the president-elect announced that the 20 members had been expelled from Libre, calling them “traitors” and “corrupt”.
The crisis began late Thursday when Castro called her party’s 50 legislators to a meeting to ask them to support Luis Redondo of the Savior Party of Honduras (PSH) as congress president.
The 20 rebel members did not attend.
On Friday, Libre leader Gilberto Rios told AFP that the 20 are backed by groups that wish to stop Castro’s promised anti-corruption campaign, including people in “organized crime” and “drug trafficking.”
Castro won elections on November 28 to become Honduras’ first woman president and end 12 years of National Party rule.
She won as part of an alliance between Libre and the PSH, to which the presidency of Congress was promised.
Castro accused the dissidents of “betraying the constitutional agreement” and “making alliances with representatives of organized crime, corruption and drug trafficking.”
Her husband Manuel Zelaya, a former president who was deposed in a 2009 coup supported by the military, business elites and the political right, is a senior Libre party official.
Castro is to be sworn in on January 27 along with other senior officials, including the congress president, at a ceremony attended by international guests including US Vice President Kamala Harris.
Central America
Arévalo warns of ‘Dark Interests’ targeting human rights defenders in Guatemala
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo de León warned on Thursday that human rights defenders are facing serious threats, aggression, and criminalization by “dark interests” embedded within the structures of the State.
“Today we are facing serious levels of threats, aggression, and criminalization against people who promote respect for human rights, coming from actors and criminal networks—sometimes embedded in State institutions—that refuse to accept that Guatemala is changing,” Arévalo said during a public event held at the former Government Palace.
During the event, authorities presented the Public Policy for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders 2025–2035, an initiative developed in compliance with a 2014 resolution from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), issued in response to the killing of activist Florentín Gudiel Ramos in 2004.
Central America
Newborn found in Costa Rican dump survives two days in unsanitary conditions
Costa Rican media outlets report that a newborn baby was found in a garbage dump, where he had reportedly spent two days in unsanitary conditions.
Police located the infant after a resident alerted authorities upon hearing crying coming from a clandestine dumping site in the Rancho Guanacaste area. The newborn was discovered alive inside a drainage channel, covered in waste. He was immediately taken to the National Children’s Hospital, where he received medical care and is now in stable condition.
“The National Children’s Hospital confirms that we indeed received a newborn approximately four or five days old who was found in a wooded area near the Alajuelita roundabout. He was first taken to the Solón Núñez Clinic and then transferred to this hospital. As of now, the baby is in the emergency department in good condition. He arrived a bit cold, but he has been warmed, fed, and his initial physical exam is completely normal,” explained hospital director Carlos Jiménez Herrera, according to CR Hoy.
Central America
Arévalo accuses Porras and judge of undermining democracy in Guatemala
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo denounced a new attempt at a “coup” orchestrated by the Attorney General’s Office. He also requested an extraordinary session at the Organization of American States (OAS) to address the country’s ongoing political crisis.
The president has been at odds with Attorney General Consuelo Porras, who has been sanctioned by the United States and the European Union for being “corrupt” and “anti-democratic.” Since 2023, Arévalo has accused Porras of launching investigations against his party, Semilla, and the 2023 elections as part of a scheme to prevent his inauguration in January 2024.
From the presidential office, Arévalo has said he continues to “resist” the “coup plotters,” but tensions escalated last Friday when Judge Fredy Orellana, at the request of the Attorney General’s Office, ordered the electoral court to annul the Semilla party’s promoter group. Arévalo interpreted this as an attempt to revoke the positions won by the party.
“Orellana, a hitman who distorts the law in service of Consuelo Porras, is attempting to force […] the unconstitutional removal of a mayor, 23 elected deputies […], the vice president, and the president of the country,” Arévalo said in a televised address on Sunday.
“We call on the international community not to turn a blind eye to the coup being attempted in Guatemala,” he added, speaking alongside his cabinet and congressional members at the National Palace in Guatemala City.
Arévalo requested that the Organization of American States hold an extraordinary session to present “the serious threats” to the Guatemalan Constitution and democracy perpetrated by Porras and Orellana.
Yesterday, Guatemalan Foreign Minister Carlos Ramiro Martínez reaffirmed the president’s statements, emphasizing the need “to go and expose the situation” Guatemala has been facing since last week due to the actions of the Attorney General’s Office.
Arévalo warns of ‘Dark Interests’ targeting human rights defenders in Guatemala
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