TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – The United States has also provided Honduras with radar information used to monitor and track a plane suspected of transporting drugs, the Honduran military chief said on Monday.
The United States suspended radar information sharing with Honduras in 2014 after the Honduran Congress passed a law authorizing its air force to shoot down planes suspected of transporting drugs.
Honduras shot down two suspected drug-running planes in 2012, and in response, the US suspended cooperation, arguing that it violated a bilateral agreement that prohibits attacks on aircraft.
The head of the Honduran Joint Chiefs of Staff, Vice Admiral Jose Fortin, tweeted a letter from the US embassy in Honduras indicating that the State Department has removed obstacles “to allow the US government to begin exchanging real-time air tracking data with Honduras.”
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“Honduras has shown that it can implement appropriate security systems,” the embassy said in a letter, addressed to Defense Minister Jose Manuel Zelaya.
The embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Zelaya said in a post on Twitter that the policy change is “a clear sign of President Xiomara Castro’s commitment to the fight against drug trafficking and regional security.”
Honduran lawmakers passed a reform in 2020 that prohibits the shooting down of planes if there are indications that there are people involved in drug trafficking.
Honduras, an important leg in the transportation of cocaine from South America to the United States, seized 7,134 kg of cocaine in 2022 after seizing 17,832 kg in 2021, according to information from the authorities.
(Reporting by Gustavo Palencia; editing by Robert Birsel)
Copyright 2023 Thomson Reuters.
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