The main opposition candidate on Saturday called for Honduras’ disputed presidential election to be held again after the nation erupted in deadly protests over the delayed vote count and the government imposed a dawn-to-dusk curfew.
Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez and his rival, television personality Salvador Nasralla, have claimed victory in the Nov. 26 vote, which the opposition says was filled with irregularities.
Clashes between protesters and troops have left at least one person — and perhaps as many as a half-dozen — dead.
Photo: Reuters
“I have asked them to repeat the elections, but only those for the presidency, with the aim of resolving the crisis that Honduras is suffering,” Nasralla said.
However, he said the new election “would be under the supervision of an international electoral tribunal, not the local one, because there aren’t sufficient conditions to guarantee” the vote would be fair.
Honduras’ national police force said a 19-year-old woman was shot to on Friday at a pro-Nasralla protest by gunmen who witnesses say were police.
Kimberly Dayana Fonseca, 19, was killed by military police in the Colonia Villanueva area east of the capital, Tegucigalpa, according to her father, Carlos Fonseca.
He said that his daughter had left their house to search for an uncle who she thought was taking part in an opposition protest to warn him that authorities were about to begin a crackdown.
“We still do not know if the assailants were police officers or not, but the case is being thoroughly investigated” a police statement said.
The Coalition Against Impunity, a network of human rights organizations, said security forces had used lethal ammunition and that four other protesters are believed to have been killed across the country.
Honduras was reported calm on Saturday after the 10-day, 6pm to 6am curfew was imposed.
Hernandez held a 1.5 percentage point lead over Nasralla with 94 percent of the vote counted.
Additional reporting by AFP
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
IN PURSUIT: Israel’s defense minister said the revenge attacks by Israeli settlers would make it difficult for security forces to find those responsible for the 14-year-old’s death Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday condemned the “heinous murder” of an Israeli teenager in the occupied West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his death. After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday, hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian villages, torching vehicles and homes, leaving at least one villager dead and dozens wounded. The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir’s body was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. Agence France-Presse correspondents saw smoke rising from burned houses and fields. Mayor Amin Abu Alyah, of the