HONDURAS ARMY LINKED TO DEATH OF 200 LEFTISTS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000403790001-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 9, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: May 2, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STnT
3 Declassified
STAT
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in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09 :CIA-RDP90-009658000403790001-1
q~IpAGE_ NEW YORK TIMES
2 May 1987
Honduras Army
Linked to Death
Of200 Leftists
lsyJAMES LeMOYNE
~V I M The Nw YOrL Times
MIAMI, May I -The Honduran
Army high command maintained a net-
work of secret jails, special interroga-
tors and kidnapping teams who de-
tained and killed nearly 200 suspected
leftists between 1980 and 198, accord-
!ng to a former Honduran Army inter-
rogator who says he was part of the
network.
The account o[ the Honduran, Florcn-
cio Caballero, may be the fullest yet
given of how army and police units
were authorized to organize death
squads that seized, interrogated and
killed suspected leftists in Honduras.
Argentine and Chilean trainers taught
the Honduran Army kidnapping and
"elimination" techniques, Mr. Ca-
ballerosaid.
His account also sheds light on the
role of the Cemral intelligence Agency
in traWng and advising a group of .
Honduran Army interrogators and an
army anti terrorist team. But Mr. Ca-
ballero added that the C.I.A. explicitly
forbade the use of physical torture or
assassination.
Mc Caballero, 29 years old, says he ',
+vas a sergeant in Honduran Army in- j
:elligence until 198 and that he was
:rained by the Central Intelligence
Agency. Much of his highly detailed ac-
count was confirmed by three Amer-I
scan and two Honduran officials. II
itath hereon, a spokesman for the 1
.. ., re a telephone interview
to cattirm or deny the C.I.A.'s involve-
meet in training or advising the Hondu-
ran poUce and army. But she explicitly
denied any C.LA. involvement in. or
sanctioning ot, the use of torture or as-
saasinadon.
The C.I.A. had access to secret army
jails and to written reports summariz-
ing the interrogation of suspected left-
ists, according to Mr. Caballero and
two American officials. The Americans
also said the C.I.A. knew the Honduran
Army was kUUng prisoners.
The C.I.A.'s role appeared co be am-
biguous. The American officials said
that at one point in 1983 the C.I.A. de-'
mended the kilUngs stop. In 198, a
C.I.A. agent was recalled from Hon-
duras after s prisoner's relative identi-
fied him as having visited a secret jail,
two American and one Honduran offi-
cial said. According to Mr. Caballero,
the agent was a regular contact be-
tween the interrogators and the C.I.A.
It appears likely, therefore, that the
C.I.A. was aware that killings were
continuing.
Mr. Caballero said his superior otfi- several of which inchded Nrst-hand ra-
cers ordered him and other members -ports of police and army participation,
of army intelligence antra to conceal according w an American official
their participation in death agwds Mr. Caballero also said that in 1983
tram C.I.A. advisers. He added that he the Honduran Army captured and
was sent to Houston for six months k ,killed several dozen leftist rebel intil-
1979 to be trained by eight people he de- trators trained in Nicaragua, as well as
scribed a>s C.I.A. instructors in interro- an American priest named James Car-
e ~~~? nay, who accompanied the rebels.
They prepared me in interrogation Mr. Caballero said he had interro-
to end the use of physical torture in gated several of the rebels before they
Honduras -they taught psychological ~ were shot to death The Honduran
methods," Mr. Caballero said of hiss Army and the United States Embassy
American training. "So when we had''. in Honduras have repeatedly said that
someone important, we hid him from most of the rebels were kUled in com-
the Americans, interrogated him our-~ bat and that others, including Father
selves and then gave him to a death Carney, died of exposure in the jungle.
squad to kill." ~ "The orders from the army high
No Comment by Honduras ~ command were to take no more pris-
i ones," Bald a Honduran military ofti-
Repeated telephone calls seeking a ~ cial aware of the operation. 'The
comment from the Honduran Army American priest was kUkd."
press spokesman were not retu The Honduran military official said
The Honduran Army high command ~ army high command tried to con-
issued a brief report in 1985 Mrgely ab- ceal the executions from the American
solving the army from responsibility i Embassy and the C.I.A.
The methods described by Mr. Ca-
ballero were even more extensivety
employed in El Salvador and Guatema-
la, where tens of thousands were killed
between 1980 and 198.
It is not clear why Mr. Caballero has
decided - in an extensive interview
with The New York Times in Central,
America and subsequent intervkws;
Mr. Caballero, who is stow seeking
asylum In Canada, said he returned to
Honduras after his American training
and wonted in an army intelligence
unit that he said was created with
'C.I.A. assbtance.
He added that his American training
included the use of such techniques as
sleep deprivation, cold and isolation.
with members of Americas Watch, a Mr. Caballero sold captives were tor-
leading American human-rights organ- ,cured by "aa many electric prods on
ization - to speak of his role in an 'their genitab as necessary," he said,
army death squad. He said he felt and by submersion in a barrel of freez-
guilty about his past and that he had a ~g water, by sexual humUiation, beat-
personal feud with other soldiers who legs, living with rats and cockroaches
had tried to kill him. He denied that he ~ and not being albwed to sleep.
had killed or physically tortured prix- i "All talked and all were killed," he
oners in tour years of secret work. said,
A spokesman for the United States
Embassy in Honduras refused to com-
ment on Mr. Caballero's charges. The
United States continues to otter police
training and military aid to Honduras,
a State Department spokesman said.
United States Embassy human
rights reports from Honduras between,
1981 and 198 appear to have consis-
tently played down repeated instances
of politically motivated killings there,
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09 :CIA-RDP90-009658000403790001-1