A street protest in Honduras. Photo: Contributed

Rights activist pushes for greater action on Honduras

Mixed reaction from students on political situation in Central American country

A human rights activist pushed Dalhousie students to take more of an interest in the ongoing political crisis in Honduras at an event at Dalhousie University on Saturday.

Francois Guindon called on the government of Canada to make stronger demands for the return of Honduran president Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales.

"The idea of doing a speaking tour regarding the coup in Honduras is to talk about the resistance movement created after the coup. We do this in order to make sure Canadians feel a concern about what's going on with the repression in Honduras," said Guindon.

Guidon spoke to about 20 people, the majority of whom were Halifax university students. Guindon is a delegate from the organization Right Action, which is a non-profit organization in the United States and Canada that supports projects for community development, the environment and human rights in Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico and El Salvador.

Part of its work includes talking with students and people interested in helping these communities. The organization came to Halifax to inform people about the situation that is happening in Honduras after the military coup, and to raise money for development and human rights support in the communities where they are working.

Honduras has been gripped by a constitutional crisis since June 28. Zelaya was detained by the Honduran military, which was acting on orders of the Honduran Supreme Court. The court blocked Zelaya's attempt at holding a referendum and ordered him to be deported to Costa Rica for allegedly violating the Honduran constitution.

A few hours after the arrest of Zelaya, Roberto Micheletti became the de facto president of Honduras. Hondurans have held a number of mass protests in the streets to support the president ousted in the military coup.

"I think was an interesting discussion," said Dalhousie student Emma Feltes, who attended the event. "It's great to have different perspectives about what is actually happening down there, because it is really hard to access information about what is going in the streets of Honduras."

King's student Gloria Hernandez said she supports the coup and the new president. She said Zelayas hadn't made good decisions and disagreed with Guidon's interpretation of events.

"I was in Honduras when all the events he was talking about happened. The information he was giving to the people was incomplete and misleading," she said .

Many organizations and governments have publicly come out against the military coup, such as the United Nations, United States and the European Union.

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