Mass Graves Found In Honduras

Associated Press, [11 August 1999]

Honduras says it has evidence of secret graves. Proof of military cover-up at contra base, officials say

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras—The Honduran government has found a gravesite containing human remains, proving that the military covered up clandestine graves at a former training base for Nicaraguan contras, justice officials said yesterday.

We have sufficient evidence that there was torture and human sacrifice on the site, the attorney general's office said in a statement. A government investigation would be completed soon, the statement said, warning the military not to interfere.

A missing American priest-turned-guerrilla, James Francis Carney, could be among those buried at the El Aguacate air base, 80 miles east of the capital, Tegucigalpa, said Honduran Human Rights Commissioner Leo Valladares.

The government launched its investigation yesterday, four days after discovering the remains at El Aguacate. They also found a concrete cross bearing the name Francisco Guzman, which officials said they did not recognize.

The 3,090-acre air base in Olancho province was built by U.S. forces in 1983 and used in the 1980s as a training center for the U.S.-backed contra forces who were fighting the leftist Sandinista government in nearby Nicaragua.

Honduran human rights official Sandra Ponce said the discovery signifies that people were buried here secretly. Last month, Valladares accused the military of hiding the existence of clandestine graves at El Aguacate. Olancho military chief Col. Leonel Pavon denied the accusation, saying that nothing is hidden in El Aguacate and any authority can prove what I say. Valladares said yesterday that he has ordered police to guard the zone until international anthropologists arrive to exhume and identify the discovered remains.