According to the New York Times, the opposition has claimed that the violent protesters and looters were infiltrators, deployed to give the government an excuse to use the security forces. Vice President Ricardo Alvarez acknowledged that many of the looters were people "taking advantage of the situation," not supporters of the opposition. Corruption is endemic in Honduras where two-thirds of the population lives in poverty. Street gangs and drug traffickers operate freely - the country is said to be one of the deadliest in the world outside a war zone.
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A familiar situation in many Latin American countries that have been 'beneficiaries' of US intervention:
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Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, using the specter of rampant crime and the drug trade, won extensive support from the American government to build up highly trained state security forces. Now, those same forces are repressing democracy.
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The post-election situation in Honduras continues to deteriorate as Hernández, a conservative leader and stalwart U.S. ally in Central America, has disputed the result of last week's vote while working to crack down on protests sweeping the nation.
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Initial results showed Salvador Nasralla, an ex-sportscaster chosen by an alliance of left-wing political parties as their candidate, leading the vote count after the November 26 presidential election. The lead was substantial enough that a magistrate on the Supreme Electoral Tribunal estimated victory by Nasralla, characterizing his lead as "irreversible."
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The next day the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE by its Spanish initials) announced that Hernandez was closing the gap. Then it suddenly stopped publicizing the tally, alleging that its electronic system went down, prompting criticism from European Union election observers. Police and military flooded the streets in the hours of silence that followed. On Wednesday, the announcement that Hernández had overtaken Nasralla in the vote count was met with disbelief. In the words of Salvadoran journalist Carlos Dada, "There are only two possibilities: Either the TSE is of Olympic incompetence or it's committing fraud."