[Peace-discuss] Hillary Clinton admits role in Honduran coup aftermath

[David Johnson]

Hillary Clinton admits role in Honduran coup aftermath

Clinton's embrace of far-right narrative on Latin America is part of
electoral strategy 

September 29, 2014 6:00AM ET 

by  <http://america.aljazeera.com/profiles/w/mark-weisbrot0.html> Mark
Weisbrot  <http://www.twitter.com/MarkWeisbrot> @MarkWeisbrot 

In a recent op-ed in The Washington Post, former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/hillary-clinton-reviews-henry-kissin
gers-world-order/2014/09/04/b280c654-31ea-11e4-8f02-03c644b2d7d0_story.html>
used a review of Henry Kissinger's latest book, "World Order," to lay out
her vision for "sustaining America's leadership in the world." In the midst
of numerous global crises, she called for return to a foreign policy with
purpose, strategy and pragmatism. She also highlighted some of these policy
choices in her memoir "Hard Choices" and how they contributed to the
challenges that Barack Obama's administration now faces.  

The chapter on Latin America, particularly the section on Honduras, a major
source of the child migrants currently pouring into the United States, has
gone largely unnoticed. In letters to Clinton and her successor, John Kerry,
<http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/108-members-of-congre
ss-urge-action-on-political-repression-and-human-rights-abuses-in-honduras>
more than 100 members of Congress have
<http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/1170> repeatedly warned about the
deteriorating security situation in Honduras, especially since the 2009
military coup that ousted the country's democratically elected President
Manuel Zelaya. As Honduran scholar Dana Frank
<http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/140283/dana-frank/hopeless-in-hondur
as> points out in Foreign Affairs, the U.S.-backed post-coup government
"rewarded coup loyalists with top ministries," opening the door for further
"violence and anarchy."

The homicide rate in Honduras, already the highest in the world, increased
by 50 percent from 2008 to 2011; political repression, the murder of
opposition political candidates, peasant organizers and LGBT activists
increased and continue to this day. Femicides skyrocketed. The violence and
insecurity were exacerbated by a generalized institutional collapse.
Drug-related violence has worsened amid allegations of
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/honduras-police-cleanup-efforts-stall>
rampant corruption in Honduras' police and government. While the gangs are
responsible for much of the violence, Honduran security forces have engaged
in
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/honduras-police-accused-death-squad-killings
> a wave of killings and other human rights crimes with impunity.

Despite this, however, both under Clinton and Kerry, the State Department's
response to the violence and military and police impunity has largely been
silence, along with continued U.S. aid to Honduran security forces. In "Hard
Choices," Clinton describes her role in the aftermath of the coup that
brought about this dire situation. Her firsthand account is significant both
for the confession of an important truth and for a crucial false testimony.

First, the confession: Clinton admits that she used the power of her office
to make sure that Zelaya would not return to office. "In the subsequent days
[after the coup] I spoke with my counterparts around the hemisphere,
including Secretary [Patricia] Espinosa in Mexico," Clinton writes. "We
strategized on a plan to restore order in Honduras and ensure that free and
fair elections could be held quickly and legitimately, which would render
the question of Zelaya moot."

This may not come as a surprise to those who followed the post-coup drama
closely. (See my commentary from 2009 on Washington's role in helping the
coup succeed
<http://www.cepr.net/index.php/op-eds-&-columns/op-eds-&-columns/top-ten-way
s> here,  <http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jul/23/opinion/oe-weisbrot23>
here and
<http://www.cepr.net/index.php/op-eds-&-columns/op-eds-&-columns/seven-weeks
-after-honduran-coup-washington-still-lagging-the-region-on-restoring-democr
acy> here.) But the official storyline, which was dutifully accepted by most
in the media, was that the Obama administration actually opposed the coup
and wanted Zelaya to return to office.

Clinton's position on Latin America in her bid for the presidency is another
example of how the far right exerts disproportionate influence on US foreign
policy in the hemisphere.

The question of Zelaya was anything but moot.
<http://www.oas.org/en/media_center/press_release.asp?sCodigo=E-214/09>
Latin American leaders, the
<http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2009/ga10840.doc.htm> United Nations
General Assembly and other international bodies vehemently demanded his
immediate return to office. Clinton's defiant and anti-democratic stance
spurred a downward slide in U.S. relations with several Latin American
countries, which has continued. It eroded the warm welcome and benefit of
the doubt that even the leftist governments in region offered to the newly
installed Obama administration a few months earlier.

Clinton's false testimony is even more revealing. She reports that Zelaya
was arrested amid "fears that he was preparing to circumvent the
constitution and extend his term in office." This is simply not true. As
Clinton must know, when Zelaya was kidnapped by the military and flown out
of the country in his pajamas on June 28, 2009, he was trying to put a
consultative, nonbinding poll on the ballot to ask voters whether they
wanted to have a real referendum on reforming the constitution during the
scheduled election in November. It is important to note that Zelaya was not
eligible to run in that election. Even if he had gotten everything he
wanted, it was impossible for Zelaya to extend his term in office. But this
did not stop the extreme right in Honduras and the United States from using
false charges of tampering with the constitution to justify the coup.

In addition to her bold confession and Clinton's embrace of the far-right
narrative in the Honduran episode, the Latin America chapter is considerably
to the right of even her own record on the region as secretary of state.
This appears to be a political calculation. There is little risk of losing
votes for admitting her role in making most of the hemisphere's governments
disgusted with the United States. On the other side of the equation, there
are influential interest groups and significant campaign money to be raised
from the right-wing Latin American lobby, including Floridian
Cuban-Americans and their political fundraisers.

 

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