The Wire

Honduras is one of the smallest nations in Latin America, set between the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean. However, despite its idyllic location, crime and violence present a serious problem. Those responsable are a mixture of organised criminals and social misfits, known as the ‘maras’. Recently the Honduran President Manuel Zelaya introduced the so-called Operation Thunder, which aimed to increase state vigilance by integrating private security guards with the Honduran police and the army, allowing them to collaborate and act to combat the maras. However, according to some estimates, there are double the number of private security guards in Honduras than the police and the army put together. And many private security guards are former members of the police, dismissed for bad conduct. In a country where two-thirds of the population lives in poverty, this mano dura or iron fist approach has raised some eyebrows. Larry Burns, Director of the US Council on Hemisphere Affairs, a non-profit organisation, about how this violence originated.