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Hi everyone. This is Carbon and Christina and this is
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the Study as Unknown, a podcast where we talk about
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Latin American history. Sometimes it's horrible and deals with heavy
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topics like racism, corruption, and genocide. But more than that,
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it's also about resistance, power and community. Okay, well, first
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I have to say it feels weird not recording every week. Yeah,
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it does like I'm missing something, you know. Anyway, we
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left off part two of Alberta Cassettes episodes with Coping
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growing into what it became, and then their protests of
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sorry you can hear my child, and then their protests
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of the proposed PPP, the Plan Buebla Project. I think
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it's what it was stood for again by or supported
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hugely by Vicente folks, which ultimately brought the Awaka damn
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to Lenkat Lands. Now we're going to get into Copen's
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fight against this dam And when I wrote this intro,
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I said we were going to get into the murder
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of Bertacas. It is, but we're not. We're not. So
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there's gonna be part five. Yeah, wait, is this part
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three or part four? This is this is part three,
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isn't it? Oh? Okay? I think this is part three
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so it's gonna be a part four, okay, because I
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could have finished this, but I have to study for
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a test tomorrow. Yeah. So yeah, we're not getting into
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the actual day of the murder and like the aftermath
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of all that in this part. This is now like
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Awa Sarka and the dam and all that. So before
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I talk about the day she was murdered, there was
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a series of events that led up to that day.
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We already went a little bit into a part two
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with the PPP and all that. But the other event
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that led to her murder, or would lead to her murder,
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is the overthrow of Celaya. And I'm not going to
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get into the intricacies of his government, nor am I
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saying that he was a perfect president or anything like that,
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because he was a president of a nation state after all.
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So but to say that a coup did not happen
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would not be factual. The Hunduran government has always denied
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US involvement in the coup itself, but the US did
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legitimize the coup after it took place, oh I see,
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And this legitimization, of course made things worse. So when
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the coup occurred, people naturally took to the streets to
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protest during the coup. Selaya was woken up early in
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the morning on the twenty eighth of June two thousand
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and nine, and then he was forced onto a plane
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by US. Sorry, just like inserting the US. He was
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forced on to a plane by soldiers. And I want
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to say these were like Special Forces soldiers probably yeah,
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part of the first battalion trained by the US. That's
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why I was accidentally going to say US soldiers. They
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were US trained soldiers, because all the special forces in
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all these Latin American countries are usually trained by the US.
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So yeah, he was forced onto a plane by them.
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This plane was heading to Costa Rica. He was like
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still in pajamas, walking up by gunpoint and forced onto
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this plane. He attempted to return to Hondunas three times,
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and each time he was prevented from entering because if
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he entered, he could continue his presidency, was the thought
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in the second attempt. Erta's husband and I know the separator,
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but I don't know when, so I don't know if
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they were still married at this point. But they continue
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to work together in both co parenting and in coping anyway,
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because they were the founders of Coping, but Sarwalro Suniga
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and another Copeing leader named Sotero Chavarria led several hundred
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people to escort the ousted president from Nicaragua into Hoduras
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and they made it back but only to the Brazilian embassy.
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No sorry. The third attempt is when they made it
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back but only to the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa. And
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he remained cooped up in the embassy for three months.
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And the embassy is where most of the protests were
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taking place. And these protests were getting more and more
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violent as the days went on. Beta's own sister, Agustina Flores,
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she happened to be getting coffee when a protest turned violent.
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The police and soldiers fired both rubber bullets and live
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bullets at crowds. Wow, they were beating women and the elderly.
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She herself was almost hit by a grenade. It just
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missed her. Damn passed down, Yeah, a full ass grenade.
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She passed out when this happened, and when she woke up,
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she was surrounded by police who were punching her and
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beating her with their clubs. The hell then she and
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at least one hundred protesters were taken to the National Stadium,
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which was being used as a makeshift detention center. When
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Berta was finally able to visit Agustina, she was severely beaten, bruised, swollen,
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and she was being held for quote crimes against the state. Wow,
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there was no crimes against the state during this time period.
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People were beaten, tortured, jailed illegally, and disappeared. It was
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very soon after this coup that rumors of a hit
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list began, and Berta was on this list. So was
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Mediam Miranda, who we talked about in the last episode.
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I don't know if you remember that she was her bestie,
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her garifuna bestI. And you might be wondering how the
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US was involved, if they didn't like officially back the coup,
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like they didn't cause the coup, because again the government
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maintains that the US was not involved in the actual
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planning of the coup, and in fact, when it first happened,
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Obama gave a press conference or address a nation whatever
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it's called, where he stated the coup was not legal
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and that President Celaya remains a president and that quote,
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it would be a terrible precedent if we started moving
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backwards into the year in which we are seeing military
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coups as a mean of political transition rather than democratic elections.
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End quote. You know what that quote was missing, but
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stating when we are seeing US backed military coups. Despite that,
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the then Secretary of State Miss Ilaria Hillary Clinton, I
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was like, Ladia, Yeah, Hillary legitimized the coup by not
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declaring it a military coup, because this is ringing bells
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for me. I remember this, this should be Yeah, it
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was pretty big when it happened, and they were being
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asked to call it a coup, a military coup officially,
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but she didn't. She refused to do it. If it
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had been declared a coup by the US, it would
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have this would have allowed them to cut off aid
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to Honduras to not help this like illegitimate government. They did, however,
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eventually cut off aid, but from two thousand and nine
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to twenty eighteen they provided two hundred million dollars in
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military aid and police aid. The aid that was cut
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off was like non military, like road improvements and things
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like that, things that could actually help. And of course,
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the choice to fund their military and police in a
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time when they were repressing the people. Yeah, yeah, and
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there was a growth in human rights violations and violence
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by them. It was a US very US. Yeah. And
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while it's always been dangerous to be an activist in
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Honduras and all of Latin America for that matter, it
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was after the two thousand and nine coup that it
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became extra dangerous. Because I made a real and TikTok
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video about Berta CAAs. It is where I mentioned it.
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It became way more dangerous after the two thousand and
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nine coup. And someone commented it was always dangerous, and
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it's like, okay, but like it legitimately became way more
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dangerous after the cup. You never said it wasn't that.
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I don't understand people's comments sometimes that okay, Yeah, So
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I just want to here to emphasize it's always been dangerous,
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but after the two thousand and nine coup and Ondudas,
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it became way more dangerous. So in August two thousand
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and nine, the interim government passed a law allowing the
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privatization and so interim government meaning after the coup, passed
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the law allowing the privatization of the country's water resources.
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Of course, then just days before the election of Portfitio
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Lobo Sosa, who went by pepet Lobo. Side note about
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pepet Lobo, his son is in prison right now in
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the US for twenty four years for conspiring to import
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cocaine into the US and his wife. Pepet Lobo's wife
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was founder guilty of three counts of misappropriation and eight
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counts of fraud. She was acquitted of some of the
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money laundry and embezzlement of public funds, but she was
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sentenced to fifty eight years and a fine of one
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point two million lempidras. There was a retrial which she
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was found guilty again for fraud and sentenced to fourteen
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years for using twelve point two million limpidras meant for
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low income children on her own children's school fees, for
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real estate and for personal credit card payments. Wow. And
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pepet Lobo himself has some corruption allegations also some well yes, corruption,
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oh okay. Side note ended. So why did I mention
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him in the first place? After my side now, I
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already forgot. Just days before his election. Just before just
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days before his election, the interim government, which was led
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by Roberto Micheletti, overturned a long standing ban on commercial
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projects in protected water reserves. It's almost like this was
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the purpose. Almost, but it has to be a coincidence, right,
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mm hmm hmm. And this overturning of this long standing ban,
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they did it in secret so groups like COPING wouldn't
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have an opportunity to oppose or vote against this or
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call this out. You know what this reminds me of.
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I'm surprised you didn't comment it. It reminds me of
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the overturn of mining. Oh yeah, they're very similar, I guess.
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Mud Mara ownA, a historian, said, this is from the book,
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but quote after the coup, you got the impression that
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the Hundurian elites were willing to facilitate the almost total
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destruction of the country to increase their wealth end quote.
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The author of the book that is my main source
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wrote after this quote, this was done by imposition, not
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consultation end quote. And that's when I asked you what
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I position meant? Okay, it makes sense being forced upon
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the people. Yeah, I was forced upon them. And this
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was kind of the final step to the birth of
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the Agua Sarka Damn. Hoduras was declared open for business
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to quote the book again because it explains it the
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mest quote. There were three steps. One Michelletti removed the
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legislative bad lucks as the international community condemned the coup.
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Two Lobo declared Onduna's open for business and the international
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community forgot about the coup. Three Congress approved a series
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of laws, concessions, and contracts by taking advantage of the
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party's majority. One thanks to the election boycott, which persuaded
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international banks and businesses to make the most out of
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the coup. It was after all, this Abert that was
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given a list of rivers to be secretly sold off
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by Congress. And this selling off included the approval of
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dozens of hydro electric dams and and this list of
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rivers was the sacred Guaalkatka River. This list was leaked
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to her, no one outside of those making this deal,
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No one was ever supposed to see it. When she
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saw this list, she led Coppin on a march to
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the presidential Palace down. They were just trying to hide everything.
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Huh yeah, thank god for whistleblowers. Seriously, this was on
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July twenty six, twenty eleven. They had illicted demands which
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included suspending several dam projects, including Awasarka, and two days
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after the march, Pebe Lobo, the President, nine ministers, and
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Berta signed a memorandum affirming the state's duty to comply
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with international conventions protecting the rights of Indigenous and Afro
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descendant peoples, which was all backed by the ILO one
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six nine. If you remember that from like episode one,
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the Lobo administration specifically agreed that no dams or other
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high impact projects would take place on Linka territory without
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consultation and approval by the Linka, which is what they're
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supposed to be doing already, but this agreement would be violated. Specifically,
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in twenty twelve, there was a vote about model cities.
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Do you know what these are? I feel like of them?
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I think you have Model cities were like private cities
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inside of Ondudas that would have their own like cops, laws, governments,
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and tax systems. Yeah, there's like a one in Adudas
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that Dawn what's it called? I know, I know, yeah,
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I know these prospera Prospera yes, yes, the tech bro
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uh Paradise or whatever the fuck. Yeah, So naturally, the
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five judge panel ruled against this because this would violate
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the Hunduran Constitution. They specifically argued, quote the foreign investment
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expected to be received by the State of hondudas implies
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transferring national territory, which is expressly prohibited in the constitution
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end quote Like this wasn't allowed, So four judges in
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this five judge panel voted against it. In response to this,
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the government dismissed the fourjudges who voted against this at midnight.
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That is so sketchy. Yeah, and a secret midnight session
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chaired by Ernandez. And yes, this is the same drug
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trafficking Juan Orlando Ernandez that was pardoned by Trump in
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twenty twenty five. Oh yeah, Also what abu move? Oh yeah,
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that's who I was thinking of as you were talking about. Yeah,
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this is just a dictatorship. Uh one oh one, If
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you will filed the class. All the things that they
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have been doing since the school was is a part
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of that class like steps towards a dictatorship or of
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a dictatorship. Those judges that were fired were replaced by
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ones that were friendly to the government, thus allowing them
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to do whatever they wanted. Guillermo Lopez Lone, one of
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the ousted, judges told the author of Who killed Berta
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Casen is my main source quote the coup marked before
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and after in the country. At first I thought it
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was a move against Selnaya, but actually it was a
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political decision to expand the economic model and the rollout
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of extractive industries, which is reforms threatened. Congress plotted the
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coup and then approved the concessions, and then when threatening