Honduras: resolution in order that the office of the prosecutor of the ICC moves from its preliminary examination to the opening of a full investigation into human rights violations and crimes against humanity

29/05/2013
Press release
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Resolution adopted by FIDH 38th Congress.

Presented by Centro de Investigación y Promoción de los Derechos Humanos - CIPRODEH, Honduras

Whereas the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), submitted to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court a “Communication for the investigation and acknowledgement by the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to the heads of the Crime of Political Persecution that has been committed in Honduras against broad sectors of civil society on the occasion of the coup d’Etat in Honduras on June 28, 2009”.

Whereas the overall situation in Honduras since the coup d’Etat has seen an increase and intensification of human rights violations perpetrated with some patterns or parameters that make such violations to be different from what is considered a criminal offence. Through systematic and continuous patterns, such violations transcend the individuality of the human person. That when in such circumstances of unequal power, the human being as an individual is attacked by those wielding state power, this is equivalent to the attacks and denials of those rights to all humanity. Regarding crimes against humanity, the humanity as such is victims and its persecution also transcends from local justice systems to international protection systems.

Whereas impunity constitutes today one of the central problems in Honduras, that it has become the nerve feeding corruption, organised crime and systematic violations of human rights. Impunity is also a reflection of the state’s failure to satisfy the desire for justice of victims and relatives.

Whereas there is a perception of complete mistrust in the institutions that make up the justice system in Honduras, the Public Prosecutor, the Judiciary, the Police, Public Defence, the National Commissioner of Human Rights, some of which are found in failed processes of institutional purification requiring that they re-create themselves and begin a process of renewal ; some rely on the same structures that led them to deny justice to countless victims of the repression during the coup d’Etat.

Whereas in the absence of justice within the institutions of the State of Honduras, there remains only the complementarity of the International Criminal Court.

As such, the Centre for the Investigation and Promotion of Human Rights “CIPRODEH” ASKS that the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) to issue a draft resolution so that the Office of the Prosecutor of International Criminal Court moves from its preliminary examination on the situation in Honduras to the opening of a full investigation of human rights violations and crimes against humanity.

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