|
Honduras:
Outstanding
Female
Work
against
Crime
Opinion
shared
by
press
media
and
social
activists
is
that
three
women
are
setting
the
agenda
in
Honduras
amid
the
criminal
turbulence:
Julieta
Castellanos,
Leslie
Portillo
and
Hilda
Caldera.
They
have
in
common
the
fact
that
they
were
affected
in a
direct
way
by
violence
and
crime,
and
the
courage
to
face
the
challenges
to
promote
work
against
them,
although
they
are
openly
in
league
with
the
organs
of
state
security,
according
to
the
newspaper
Proceso
Digital.
The
work
of
these
women
is
particularly
outstanding
in
light
of
the
figures
issued
by
the
government
of
Honduras,
which
suggest
that
the
Central
American
country
accumulated
more
than
300
female
victims
of
murder
and
3,500
violent
deaths
only
in
the
first
semester
of
2011.
Such
data
reinforces
the
view
of
the
country
as
the
most
violent
in
the
region
and
the
world,
with
82.1
homicides
for
each
100,000
inhabitants,
according
to
the
United
Nations
Office
against
Drug
and
Crime.
Between
2010
and
December
2011,
17
journalists
were
murdered
without
their
causes
having
been
clarified,
an
unacceptable
fact
in a
democratic
society,
in
the
opinion
of
the
International
Trade
Union
Confederation.
In
spite
of
the
threat
that
this
entails,
especially
for
a
vulnerable
population
like
women,
the
three
women
made
an
impact
in
the
media
because
of
the
enormity
of
their
tragedies,
but
more
so
because
they
spoke
up
and
undertook
the
civic
fight
from
their
neighborhoods.
Portillo,
for
example,
shocked
people
with
the
testimony
about
the
death
of
her
husband,
General
Julián
Arístides
González,
who
was
at
the
head
of
the
fight
against
drug
trafficking
until
he
was
murdered
by
hit
men
in
2009.
In
the
middle
of
the
"Honduran
spring
against
crime",
as
the
media
describe
this
part
of
the
year
in
the
country,
the
woman
denounced
that
the
ones
who
murdered
her
spouse
were
police
officers,
and
although
everybody
knows
it,
the
justice
system
never
acted
against
the
culprits.
"It
is
known
those
who
killed
him
were
policemen,
that
they
locked
themselves
in
the
bunker
of
Casamata,
it
is
in
the
files,
everybody
knows
who
has
the
file,
the
Attorney
General
knows
it,
the
detectives
know
it.
The
people
that
killed
my
husband
are
from
the
Police",
she
reiterated.
Portillo
explained
that
after
the
fact
her
family
disintegrated,
her
children
had
to
emigrate
and
she
continued
in
Honduras
without
protection,
in
spite
of
multiple
and
constant
threats.
"One
day
after
my
husband
gave
statements
to
the
press
they
killed
him,
and
it
is
known,
everything
that
my
husband
was
risking
day
by
day,
what
had
to
be
done,
now
it
is
that
they
are
conducting
all
those
raids
and
confiscating
goods",
she
said.
A
few
hours
after
Portillo´s
statements,
former
security
advisor
Alfredo
Landaverde
was
killed
in a
violent
way.
This
shocked
the
Honduran
society
and
confirmed
the
impunity
with
which
criminals
act
against
those
who
fight
crime.
Another
of
the
women,
Hilda
Caldera,
a
Venezuelan
sociologist
specialized
in
issues
of
juvenile
violence,
demanded
justice
for
her
husband's
murder
and
recalled
that
he
was
one
of
the
social
workers
most
respected
for
his
moral
integrity
to
act
against
crime
from
his
public
functions.
"My
husband
didn't
die
in
vain,
he
was
killed
because
he
spoke
out;
he
didn't
have
a
position,
nor
money,
only
his
honesty,
gallantry
and
courage",
she
reiterated
after
Landaverde
was
murdered
on
Wednesday,
December
7.
"I
have
a
bullet
in
the
column
and
another
in
the
back,
that
thank
God,
did
not
touch
any
vital
organ,
but
this
will
serve
me
to
go
ahead
with
the
work
that
my
husband
had
undertaken
for
the
good
of
Honduras,
a
country
that
I
have
adopted
as
mine",
said
Caldera,
who
is
of
Venezuelan
origin.
Proceso
Digital
recalled
that
earlier
the
other
woman,
Julieta
Castellanos,
the
rector
of
the
Autonomous
National
University
of
Honduras
(UNAH),
had
sparked
social
reflection
in a
society
that
is
terrorized
by
fear.
Castellanos,
the
founder
of
the
Observatory
of
Violence,
reinforced
her
struggle
against
crime
in
the
country
after
her
son
Rafael
Alejandro
Vargas
was
murdered,
along
with
his
friend
Carlos
Pineda
Rodriguez,
on
October
22.
The
crime
was
executed
presumably
by
elements
of
the
National
Police
of
Honduras
and
it
changed
the
ideas
of
the
country
about
impunity,
because
since
it
occurred,
fear
began
to
receded
and
people
began
to
openly
accuse
police
officers
at
all
levels.
From
that
date
until
the
beginning
of
December,
there
have
been
more
than
3,
500
accusations
against
police
agents,
and
the
government
of
Porfirio
Lobo
had
to
adopt
urgent
measures
to
counteract
popular
pressure.
"The
National
Police
is
the
most
dangerous
criminal
organization
in
the
country;
this
is
the
dramatic
conclusion
arrived
at
by
the
technical
team
of
the
UNAH
after
a
wide-ranging
analysis
of
the
crisis
of
insecurity
oppressing
Hondurans",
pointed
out
Castellanos.
The
rector
stressed
that
the
Police
is
the
most
dangerous
criminal
sector
in
the
country
and
argued
for
the
need
to
intervene
the
institution
with
the
participation
of
external
elements
to
support
the
process.
Castellanos
has
reiterated
that
she
will
not
rest
until
she
achieves
her
objective,
just
like
hundreds
of
women
and
men
from
every
corner
of
the
nation
who
grow
stronger
day
by
day
in
their
efforts
to
curb
crime
in
Honduras. |
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