Honduras

Madam President of this General Assembly, Mr. Secretary-General of the United Nations, Distinguished Presidents, Prime Ministers, and dignitaries representing countries at this great Assembly of the United Nations.

I appear before this podium as the President of Honduras, representative of a people who have resisted oppression, exploitation, and structural violence imposed for centuries. Today I am threatened by the same forces of capital that, 15 years ago, carried out a coup d'état against the constitutional president Manuel Zelaya. I denounced this new conspiracy in the streets, in massive gatherings of the people, on September 14 and 15, the day of our nation's independence.

I am threatened because I have promoted structural changes to the economic model and have denounced the unjust tax regime that perpetuates inequalities, feeds the powerful, and exploits the poor.

Our sovereignty is a fundamental basis and non-negotiable principle of international relations, but in Honduras colonial practices, interference, and economic, media, and political domination continue to be imposed. Supranational powers, and some multinational corporations, are the product of corrupt public-private elites whose only purpose is to increase their capital.

Globalization has failed in its mission to bring prosperity to the peoples. Its results show the concentration of wealth in the richest countries and among elites, while the working class is left behind and forced to migrate in order to survive.

In this Assembly, most heads of state of Latin America and the Caribbean have denounced global capitalism as the main destroyer of natural resources and oppressor of humanity's living conditions. The accumulation of economic profit prevails over human interest, and the role of international financial institutions, with their conditional loans and fiscal and financial prescriptions, only worsens the poverty and dependency of our nations.

Privatizing neoliberal policies continue to deteriorate people's access to water and energy services, to health, education, social security, and employment.

Free trade agreements, imposed on our peoples, violate sovereignty and eliminate the possibility of our producers competing on equal terms, driving up the cost of living every day.

Peace, justice, freedom, and democracy remain founding values of our nation, and for that reason we do not accept their hijacking by the 10 most powerful families of Honduras, who have appropriated our main economic resources and refuse to accept the changes I am promoting. We must deepen our democratic system through popular consultations and the real, direct, and effective participation of the people.

The transnational project of Model Cities, the ZEDEs, which sold off our territory piece by piece as spoils for multinational capital, approved by stateless collaborators under the previous narco-regime, has been definitively cancelled by my Democratic Socialism government. I acknowledge the historic ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice and the support of the National Congress.

I have denounced the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) because it constitutes an unjust arbitration scheme in which private interests prevail over the interests of national states.

In these two years and eight months, I approved a structural reform to restore the single treasury account, dismantling a corruption scheme built around trust funds through which state resources were plundered. Thanks to the dismantling of this corruption scheme, I am now providing for boys and girls in every school in Honduras, who now receive daily School Meals, Free Enrollment, and I am bringing projects to communities living in extreme poverty.

We have increased basic grain production in both planting seasons with more than one and a half million technology grants to producers who now receive seeds and fertilizers free of charge; likewise, we have promoted housing credit and agricultural credit at the lowest interest rates in Honduras's history, as well as the organization of community rural savings banks.

We are rescuing the National Electric Energy Company, the Honduran Institute of Agricultural Marketing (IHMA), and the National Basic Products Supplier (BANASUPRO), which were privatized and abandoned during 12 years of narco-dictatorship. Today we benefit more than 800,000 families who receive free electricity, and we subsidize fuel prices to benefit all Honduran consumers with the lowest prices in Central America. There has been a reduction of 10 lempiras per gallon of fuel.

Investment in infrastructure is the highest in the country's history; we are rescuing the public sector, with the historic approval of the construction of 8 hospitals, the repair of thousands of schools, 3 national airports, the construction of highways, productive roads, bridges, inter-municipal paving, multi-sport courts throughout the country, and the restoration of the two great National Stadiums. I cannot fail to mention the largest and most ambitious project in Honduras's history: the Plan for the construction of an Interoceanic Railway between Puerto Castilla on the Atlantic and the Port of Amapala on the Pacific.

In these 2 years and 8 months we have reduced poverty by 12 percentage points. With the Crime Solution Plan, confirmed by the Secretariat of Security with the cooperation of the Armed Forces, there has been a historic 15-point reduction in homicides, the largest reduction in 20 years. My Zero Deforestation program for the year 2030 has achieved historic results in the conservation of protected areas, forests, and rivers of Honduras. The honest and patriotic use of public funds in the single state treasury account is for the benefit of the people.

Peoples of the world, I want to raise my voice over the murder of Juan López, a Honduran social and political leader who consistently denounced the extractivist exploitation model. I repudiate and condemn this vile murder. I have ordered that the full capacity of the security forces and the justice system be used to investigate, identify, capture, and convict those who ordered and those who carried out this crime.

My solidarity with his family, friends, and companions.

I am the Pro Tempore President of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). We are 33 States. As President of Honduras, my first action was to raise my voice to denounce the genocide against the Palestinian people. More than 40,000 innocent people have now been killed by a bombardment that some countries have rewarded with their silence. From here I also raise my voice to demand an end to this genocide.

Lebanon must not become another Gaza Strip; we demand an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon.

The Haitian people demand our cooperation and solidarity as an organization of Latin American and Caribbean countries. Haiti, the first homeland liberated from colonialism, deserves all our attention, and in the coming days I will convene the presidents who make up CELAC to demonstrate our commitment.

For more than 30 years, this General Assembly has rejected, by an overwhelming majority, the inhumane embargo against the people of Cuba. This infamous blockade began in 1960, and since 1992 this General Assembly has issued more than thirty resolutions calling on the United States to end this cruel blockade.

I demand an end to the unjust blockade against the sister peoples of Nicaragua and Venezuela. We demand that Cuba be removed from the list of terrorist countries.

Yesterday I handed Secretary-General António Guterres the agreement that formalizes United Nations support for the fight against corruption and impunity. I thank this Assembly for approving our request in favor of creating this mechanism to combat public-private corruption.

As our martyr Berta Cáceres, a valiant woman, defender of our natural resources and our indigenous peoples, said: "Let us awaken, humanity, we are still on time." May this be the call of our generation.

Thank you very much.