US resumes sharing radar information with Honduras, official says

By Gustavo Palencia

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) - The United States has resumed providing Honduras with radar information used for the surveillance and pursuit of aircraft suspected of transporting drugs, a Honduran military chief said on Monday.

The United States suspended radar information cooperation with Honduras in 2014 after the Honduran Congress passed a law that authorized its air force to shoot down aircraft suspected of transporting drugs.

Honduras shot down two suspected drug-running planes in 2012, and in response, the U.S. suspended cooperation, arguing it violated a bilateral agreement prohibiting attacks on civilian aircraft.

The head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Honduran Armed Forces, Vice Admiral Jose Fortin, posted on Twitter a letter from the U.S. embassy in Honduras indicating that the State Department had lifted restrictions to "allow the U.S. government to resume the exchange of real-time air tracking data with Honduras."

"Honduras has demonstrated that it can employ adequate security procedures," the embassy said in the letter, addressed to Defense Minister Jose Manuel Zelaya.

The embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Zelaya said in a post on Twitter that the policy change was a "clear sign of President Xiomara Castro's commitment in the fight against drug trafficking and in the security of the region."

Honduran lawmakers passed reforms in 2020 preventing aircraft from being shot down if there are indications that people who are not participating in illicit drug trafficking are on board.

Honduras, an important leg in the smuggling of cocaine from South America to the United States, seized 7,134 kg of cocaine in 2022 after seizing 17,832 kg in 2021, according to information from military authorities.

(Reporting by Gustavo Palencia; editing by Robert Birsel)