Tegucigalpa. The Commission of Truth (“The True Commission” or Comisión de Verdad) opened its public office in Tegucigalpa today to attend to victims wishing to offer new testimonies and to follow-up on previously given testimonies in order to clarify the facts surrounding human rights violations perpetrated during and since the coup d’état in Honduras in June of 2009.
The office is located on the second floor of the COPEMH building on Boulevard Centro América and is coordinated by Nora Miselem, well-recognized in Honduras and internationally as an advocate against torture and for human rights.
The True Commission relies on the legitimacy granted to it by the Honduran people, who are seeking justice for the aggressions they have suffered, as well as the identification of those responsible for these abuses. To date there are two thousand cases of human rights violations registered by organizations who belong to the Honduran Human Rights Platform.
In February, an office was opened in San Pedro Sula offering attention to the public, where testimonies and information are being collected that will be included in the Commission’s final report, to be presented at the end of the year in the interests of contributing towards historical clarification efforts and that will include recommendations for the application of justice in the country.
The offices will receive denouncements from the public and in turn keep the public informed of ways to make their testimonies heard and ensure follow up to cases of human rights violations.
Along with the work carried out in the offices in San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa, throughout the months of March and April the Commission’s investigative team will be conducting visits around the county, with the support of the international community, in order to receive information from victims as well as allies who want to support this search for the truth.
The Tegucigalpa office was inaugurated today, March 8th, International Women’s Day, at 10:00am and included the presence of Commissioner Fausto Milla, Executive Secretary Thomas Loudon, and representatives of the Human Rights Platform, including the Centre for the Rights of Women (CDM), the Honduran Committee for Human Rights (CODEH), the Committee of Relatives of the Detained and Disappeared of Honduras (COFADEH), the Centre for the Investigation and Promotion of Human Rights (CIPRODEH), FIAN International – Honduras, and the Centre for the Prevention, Treatment, and Rehabilitation of Torture Victims and their Families (CPTRT).
The invitation has been extended to organizations and individuals who have demonstrated strong interest and support for the work of the Commission of Truth since its creation in June of 2010, on the anniversary of the coup d’état which ingrained the conditions of defencelessness experienced by the Honduran population, who is in turn increasing its efforts to end impunity and achieve justice.
The Commission of Truth’s objective is to dignify those who have directly suffered or who have lost a loved one at the hands of repressive state structures by offering justice; its work is not to justify the acts or to absolve those who have violated human rights. For the Commission, “there is no truth without justice,” and the Commission’s work is a call to face the lies – testimonies are considered key tools for achieving this objective. The office’s doors in Tegucigalpa are now open to receive this valuable information. The telephone number for attention to the public is (504) 2292-0706.