Honduran snub highlights anti-US swing in Latin America

Honduras is threatening to ditch a bilateral extradition treaty, furthering a pattern of snubs delivered against the United States by an array of Latin American leaders.

Anti-American rhetoric has been on the rise in the region, with presidents of partner countries — not just avowed U.S. rivals — casually leveling accusations of U.S.-led plots and coups.

Honduran President Xiomara Castro ordered her government to drop the U.S.-Honduras extradition treaty after U.S. Ambassador Laura Dogu expressed concern over Honduran military officials meeting with Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López, a prominent member of President Nicolás Maduro’s inner circle.

“A plan is being hatched against my government and it’s important that the people know this,” Castro said, according to Reuters .

“I won’t allow the extradition instrument to be used to intimidate or blackmail the Honduran Armed Forces. We’re defending our armed forces, not coups.”

Padrino is under indictment by the U.S. Department of Justice for allegedly running a drug trafficking operation through Belize, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico.

Castro’s saber-rattling follows a week of heightened U.S.-Mexico tensions , with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador declaring his relationship with the U.S. embassy on “pause” after Ambassador Ken Salazar said a judicial reform proposal “represents a risk for the functioning of Mexico’s democracy, and the integration of the American, Mexican and Canadian economies.”

“I think these people are showing their true colors. I think it’s about time the U.S. wakes up and realizes who their friends are, who are not their friends, who’s willing to work with them, who’s not willing to work with them,” said Eddy Acevedo, chief of staff and senior adviser at the Wilson Center.

Seeking distance from the United States is ideologically consistent for regional leaders like Castro, López Obrador and others like Colombian President Gustavo Petro, all of whom to some extent embrace the historical vision of the United States as a post-colonial interventionist power in Latin America.

But Castro’s motivations could be more personal than historical.

In 2009, Castro’s husband, Manuel “Mel” Zelaya, was ousted as president of Honduras in a coup.

While the Obama administration was critical of the coup itself, the United States quickly moved to recognize a post-coup swift election that much of Latin America saw as de facto support for the coup.

Porfirio Lobo Sosa, the president who won that election, and Juan Orlando Hernández, his successor, both have direct links to the multinational drug trade. Hernández is serving a 45-year sentence for drug trafficking in the United States. Lobo’s son Fabio is serving a 24-year sentence, and Lobo had related corruption charges dismissed in Honduras this year but has been under U.S. sanctions for his alleged corruption since 2021.

In 2022, the Biden administration hyped Castro’s election, sending Vice President Harris as the guest of honor to her full-stadium inauguration.

But that doesn’t mean Zelaya let bygones be bygones.

“Mel Zelaya is seizing the moment, driven by alliances with [Nicaraguan President Daniel] Ortega and economic opportunities with Maduro and [El Salvadorean President Nayib] Bukele. With U.S. elections looming and migration dominating the agenda, he sees an opening to distance from the U.S. and align with Russia and China without fearing strong U.S. retaliation,” said Carl Meacham, a former Republican Senate Foreign Relations Committee senior staff for Latin America.

“Revenge was inevitable, as the U.S. abandoned him after the coup. Now, with his wife in power, they’re back with a vengeance, exposing the shortsightedness of U.S. policy during the Lobo and Hernandez years.”

Castro threatened to pull the extradition treaty that would have brought Padrino to justice in the United States — ironically, the same treaty that allowed the United States to take custody of Hernández.

A State Department spokesperson told The Hill the treaty remains in force.

“Extradition is a valuable law enforcement tool that has benefitted both the people of Honduras and the United States.  We strongly urge the Government of Honduras to reconsider this decision, as it will hurt efforts by Honduras and the United States to jointly fight narcotrafficking and bring criminals to justice,” the spokesperson said in an email.

But leaders like Castro and López Obrador are taking advantage of yet another tense election year in the United States, spouting anti-American rhetoric both to score internal political points, and playing into a larger geopolitical push to weaken U.S. influence worldwide.

Castro’s first big play on the global scene was to recognize communist China in 2023, dropping a longstanding diplomatic relationship with Taiwan.

China’s interest in Latin America is multifaceted — political and security interests are intertwined, if not secondary, to economic interests both in Latin America as a market and provider of raw materials, and as a gateway to the U.S. market.

But China is not the only major power looking to Latin America, a region that’s rarely a high U.S. foreign policy priority under either Democratic or Republican administrations.

“Our future is tied to this region, and we have seen in recent years all these nefarious actors, the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, gaining a foothold. And we have to be able to counter that,” said Acevedo.

“From a Russian perspective, they see it as a very small investment that’s getting them a very large return. Right? Because further instability in the Western Hemisphere only impacts the U.S. more. Further migration out of Venezuela impacts the U.S. more. The Kremlin and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s objective is to further chaos, instability in the region and undermine U.S. interests,” he added.

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