Central America

Honduras under state of emergency over gang activity

Photo: Honduras al día

| By AFP |

Police stepped up their presence on the streets of Honduras Friday after President Xiomara Castro declared a state of emergency to quash a rise in gang activity in the Central American nation.

The small country has long been plagued by poverty, gangs, and violence linked to drug trafficking. Gangs have recently been extorting ordinary citizens as they go about their business.

“To strengthen efforts to recover lawless areas in the neighborhoods, in villages, in departments, I declare a national state of emergency,” said Castro on Thursday.

An AFP photographer reported a heavy presence of special forces and other officers in the capital on Friday.

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The state of emergency comes just days after hundreds of truckers protested in the capital Tegucigalpa to demand the government take steps to stop gangs from extorting a “war tax” from them.

Castro, elected the country’s first woman president in January, declared “war on extortion, just as we declared war on corruption, impunity, and drug trafficking.”

She urged the police to recover public spaces “assaulted and controlled by organized crime and its gangs.”

She asked police to identify hotspots where “the partial suspension of constitutional guarantees” would be necessary.

Police chief Gustavo Sanchez said he would dedicate more money and at least 20,000 officers to the efforts to stamp out gang activity.

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Along with neighbors El Salvador and Guatemala, Honduras forms the so-called “triangle of death” plagued by the murderous gangs called “maras” that control drug trafficking and organized crime.

In 2020, there were 37.6 recorded homicides per 100 000 inhabitants.

High poverty and unemployment, mixed with gang and drug violence, forces nearly 800 Hondurans to leave the country every day, mainly headed for the United States, where more than a million already live, most of them undocumented.

International

Trump Says Iran Is Welcome at 2026 World Cup but Warns of Security Concerns

The President of the United States, Donald Trump, said Thursday that the national football team of Iran is “welcome” to participate in the 2026 World Cup, although he suggested it might be safer for the team not to take part in the tournament.

“The Iranian national soccer team is welcome at the World Cup, but I really don’t think it’s appropriate for them to be there, for their own safety,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.

His comments came a day after Iran’s sports minister, Ahman Donyamali, said that there are currently no conditions for the country to participate in the tournament following the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, during a military offensive launched on February 28 by Israel and the United States.

“After the corrupt government killed our leader, there are no conditions that allow us to take part in the World Cup,” the Iranian official said. He added that the country has faced two wars in the past eight or nine months, resulting in thousands of civilian deaths, making participation in the tournament unlikely.

On Tuesday, the president of FIFA, Gianni Infantino, met with Trump at the White House.

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Following the meeting, Infantino said that Trump reiterated that Iran’s national team would be allowed to compete in the FIFA World Cup 2026.

“We discussed the current situation in Iran and the fact that the Iranian team has qualified to participate in the FIFA World Cup 2026. During the conversation, President Trump reiterated that the Iranian team is, of course, welcome to compete in the tournament in the United States,” Infantino wrote on Instagram.

Central America

UN Rapporteur Warns of “Deep Crisis” in Guatemala’s Judicial System

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Margaret Satterthwaite, said Monday that Guatemala’s judicial system is facing a “deep crisis” after evaluating the country’s institutional situation.

Speaking at a press conference in Guatemala City, the UN official explained that several factors have weakened judicial independence and placed the justice system in a “critical” situation.

Among the main problems identified were the “instrumentalization of justice,” concentration of power, and persecution of judicial officials, elements that, according to Satterthwaite, undermine the functioning of the rule of law in the country.

Satterthwaite presented these conclusions while releasing her final report on the visit she carried out in May 2025, when she spent 12 days in Guatemala assessing the performance of the judicial system.

During her stay, she met with judges, prosecutors, public defenders, lawyers, lawmakers, civil society organizations, and representatives of Indigenous communities, as well as officials from the executive, judicial, and legislative branches. These meetings took place in Guatemala City and in the departments of Quetzaltenango and Alta Verapaz.

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The rapporteur also reiterated her concern about the role of the Public Ministry of Guatemala, noting that the information collected points to the existence of a policy of criminalization against justice operators.

Despite this scenario, Satterthwaite expressed confidence that Guatemala can reverse the situation, highlighting that the country’s Constitution has previously demonstrated the ability to guarantee respect for the rule of law.

She also stressed that key appointments expected in the coming months will be decisive for the future of the judicial system, including the selection of a new Constitutional Court of Guatemala, a new Supreme Electoral Tribunal of Guatemala, and a new attorney general to replace the current head of the Public Ministry, Consuelo Porras.

“The appointments scheduled for 2026 to the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, and the Public Ministry will be decisive in determining whether the current patterns of institutional capture and impunity will be consolidated or reversed,” the rapporteur concluded.

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Central America

UN Report Warns of Nicaragua’s “Transnational” Surveillance Network Targeting Dissidents

A special panel of the United Nations accused the government of Nicaragua on Tuesday of diverting public funds to finance the repression of political opposition both inside and outside the country, including through what it described as a “transnational network” of surveillance and intelligence.

The panel presented a new report to the press on the situation in the Central American nation, which has been governed since 2007 by President Daniel Ortega and his wife and vice president Rosario Murillo.

Based on dozens of interviews and extensive documentary evidence, the report states that since 2018—the year when student protests erupted and were violently suppressed—public funds have been diverted to support repression, including money originally allocated for social assistance programs and public sanitation projects.

According to the report, a “parallel structure” was created within the ruling Sandinista National Liberation Front to channel resources toward security operations, pro-government armed groups, and party activities.

The investigation was carried out at the request of the United Nations Human Rights Council.

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Another key finding of the report concerns the existence of a surveillance and intelligence network that extends far beyond Nicaragua’s borders, allegedly used to monitor, intimidate, and target hundreds of thousands of Nicaraguans living abroad.

The report documents an intelligence structure involving the military, police, migration authorities, the telecommunications regulator TELCOR, diplomatic missions, and operators linked to the FSLN.