We, the undersigned, note that ten years ago (June 28 2009) a military coup ousted Honduras’ democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya.

During his presidency, Zelaya had raised the minimum wage and began negotiating with campesino movements to restore land rights. These and other planned reforms efforts angered the country’s oligarchy, leading to his overthrow.

The coup was widely condemned by governments across Latin America, the EU, and the OAS, but not by the United States government, which has continued to support successive right-wing Honduran governments since. This is despite evidence of electoral fraud, widespread corruption and the criminalisation and repression of political dissent, including assassinations of activists.

The British government is complicit too, having sold to the Honduran government spyware designed to eavesdrop on its citizens, months before the state rounded up thousands of people in a well-orchestrated surveillance operation.

Ten years on from the coup, we stand in solidarity with Honduras’ democratic resistance movements and call on Western governments to stop propping up the current right-wing, repressive regime.

Yours,

John Pilger, journalist & filmmaker
Michael Mansfield QC
Brian Eno, musician
Andy De La Tour, actor
Lloyd Russell-Moyle MP
Neil Findlay MSP
Tony Burke, Assistant General Secretary, Unite the Union
Ronnie Draper, General Secretary, Bakers Food & Allied Workers Union
Zita Holbourne, National Vice President PCS, National Chair BARAC UK, author & artist
Kate Hudson, CND General Secretary
Lindsey German, Stop the War Coalition Convenor
Rachel Garnham, Labour Party NEC
Claudia Webbe, Labour Party NEC
Colin Burgon, Honorary President, Labour Friends of Progressive Latin America