Assassination of 4 Student Leaders in Honduras Prompts Protests

[Luiz 4,253]

http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Assassination-of-4-Student-Leaders-in-Honduras-Prompts-Protests-20150327-0001.html

Four high school students who organized several demonstration against Honduras’ education minister last week were found dead in the country's capital. Soad Ham, a 13-year-old student leader of the Central Institute of Tegucigalpa who participated in the student protests against the Honduran government in the last two weeks, was found tortured and killed inside a plastic bag Wednesday.

On Thursday, the opposition Libre Party called for protests against the assassination Ham and 3 other student leaders this week. The largest public high schools in the country have been protesting against the decision to change the class schedule, which will mean that the students in the afternoon will leave their schools at 7 p.m. – a very dangerous hour for students to be on the streets of Latin America’s most dangerous city. Public high schools are generally located in areas riddled with crime, and there is no public transportation services at those hours. Moreover, many students live in dangerous areas where organized crime has established curfew hours.

 

The decision was taken by Marlon Escoto, Education Minister, who argued that adding five minutes to each class would improve the quality of education in the country. Students criticized the decision however, saying that in many class rooms there are not even enough chairs students. The students, along with teachers and parents have been demanding changes to the education system and protests have often been met with repression from police. The murder of the students has moved other groups to become more active in the issue. "We came here in solidarity with the families of the victims that have lost their lives in this student struggle and we want to denounce this ridiculous state that we have in Honduras,” said former President Manuel Zelaya, who is now coordinator of the Libre Party. “They are directly responsible for the existence of death squads, because they protect them with their silence, they protect them knowing they exist." During the march, students denounced profiling by intelligence agents as one example of abuse of power from the authorities. One infiltrated police agent was discovered during the demonstration, but protesters were able to handle the situation without any aggression against the public official. The protesters marched toward the Presidential House and demanding the resignation of President Juan Hernandez and Education Minister Escoto.

[Goosey 3,017]

From what I've heard, everything down there is a mess right now. This is borne out by the fact there's not a single "developed country" south of the US border.

[Morphine Prince 109,700]

Seriously? Killing 13 year olds? And what a stupid change the education board wants to make. They should just kill some of the students because that's what will happen if they are released from school at 7 PM. It's like they literally want to make them targets of organized crime. 

And the Libre party and Manuel Zealaya are a joke and are just using this to get press to look good. They need to stfu and go back to their ****hole where they belong.