Curfew announced in Honduras after wave of violence

The Honduran government announced curfews in two northern cities on Sunday after more than 20 people were killed overnight in separate attacks amid escalating violence in the country.

Heavily armed men opened fire at a pool hall in a neighborhood of the northern manufacturing city of Choloma on Saturday night, killing 13 people and seriously wounding another, the police journalist told Reuters.
Edgardo Barahona.

He added that on Saturday there were at least 11 other deaths in separate episodes in the northern part of Valle de Sula, including the industrial city of San Pedro Sula. Initially a source had indicated that the victims of these separate events could be eight.

The leftist president Xiomara Castro announced in a message on Twitter the imposition of a 15-day extendable curfew in Choloma starting Sunday between 9 p.m. and 4 a.m. The measure will also take effect from July 4 in San Pedro Sula, added the president.

“Multiple operations, raids, captures, and checkpoints begin 24 hours a day, applying a special curfew for Choloma from this day on; from 9 p.m. to 4 a.m., and in Sps the curfew will be from of the 4
of July. With 15 days extendable,” Castro said on the social network.

The Security Minister, General Gustavo Sánchez, who took office this week, announced that “in the coming days a proposal would be sent to the sovereign National Congress to classify as terrorists the members of a criminal structure, maras or gangs.”

The minister, at a press conference in San Pedro Sula, added that they are sending an additional 1,000 police officers and soldiers to the Sula Valley, where Choloma and San Pedro Sula are located, among other cities.

The government offered a reward of 800,000 Lempiras, about $32,400, to people who help identify and capture those responsible for the massacre in Choloma, the president added.

“I have taken measures to give them security in the face of the brutal and ruthless terrorist attack to which they are subjected by hired thugs trained and directed by the drug lords who operate with impunity in the drug corridor; Valle de Sula,” Castro said.

The crimes in Choloma and other cities in the Sula Valley take place while a partial state of exception has been in force since December in part of Honduras imposed to confront violent gangs and organized crime.

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