In the first 13 days of 2019, there were five major killings in Honduras in what local media are calling massacres, TeleSUR English said. All up, 18 people were killed by gunmen.
The Honduran Attorney General’s office and the national police say they are investigating the rash of murders but no suspects have been apprehended yet.
TeleSUR English said that the spate of massacres does not include the several other homicides that have taken place alongside these violent massacres in Honduras this year. In total, 14 people died violent deaths on January 1 alone.
The murder rate in Honduras has spiked dramatically since a US-backed 2009 military coup, with environmentalists, indigenous people and social movement activists frequently targeted for assassination.