One week after a military coup in Honduras, soldiers and riot police blocked the airport runway Sunday evening preventing ousted President Manuel Zelaya from returning to the country. Heavily armed Honduran soldiers also used tear gas and machine guns to disperse an unarmed crowd of tens of thousands of people who had come from all over the country, despite military blockades, to wait at the airport and welcome back their ousted President. At least two people were reportedly killed and more wounded.
Excellent coverage at Democracy Now!
I found this exchange highly interesting:
JUAN GONZALEZ: Didn’t he also, Zelaya, take other stands that were diametrically opposed to US policy? For instance, he began coming out questioning whether the drug war was a legitimate war and should–there should be a possible legalization of drugs. And also, didn’t he raise the minimum wage substantially in a country where there’s a lot of free trade zones and people working in factories for foreign companies?
NIKOLAS KOZLOFF: Well, right. I mean, the first salvo against the Honduran elite was his moves to raise the minimum wage by 60 percent. And you’re right. I mean, this is a country where you have these maquiladora assembly plants, and the Honduran elite were, to say the least, displeased by the moves
It’s worth your time to read the transcripts, we-the USA is hip deep in this situation, and you’d hardly know it from the main stream media coverage.
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