The video in which Carlos Zelaya, brother-in-law of Honduran President Xiomara Castro, meets with drug lords from the Central American country, was made public by the think tank and media outlet InSight Crime and accusations about the “evident hidden intention” of breaking the extradition treaty with the United States gained strength: the president would try to prevent her relatives from being sent to the United States to answer for drug trafficking crimes.
The report, which has also been published on the organization’s website and is titled ‘Video shows drug traffickers negotiating bribes with Honduran president’s brother-in-law’, highlights that “some of Honduras’ biggest drug traffickers” met in November 2013 with “a member of the presidential family”, to whom they offered $500,000 to “help the ruling party and the failed campaign of current President Xiomara Castro”.
Carlos Zelaya, brother of former President Manuel Zelaya, admitted on Saturday, August 31, that he met with drug traffickers in 2013, although he denied having received money, and announced his resignation as secretary of the Honduran Parliament.
InSight Crime says the video “tells a slightly different story” and, although it was recorded with a spy camera hidden in the watch of one of the drug traffickers, “the images and audio are clear enough and show the traffickers recalling past contributions, allegedly paid to former President Manuel Zelaya, Castro’s husband, Carlos’ brother and founder of the Libre Party.”
In the video, the drug traffickers discuss “how much they are going to give Mel (Manuel Zelaya) between them all, an amount that they confirm with (Carlos) Zelaya,” who also “negotiates with the traffickers the rental of up to 10 vehicles for the party to use during the campaign,” the report states.
The Honduran president won the 2021 elections “promising to fight drug trafficking and corruption,” two scourges “embodied” in her predecessor, Juan Orlando Hernández, who was sentenced in June to 45 years in prison by a US court for conspiring with drug traffickers.
InSight Crime highlights that the video “is further shocking evidence of the depth of drug traffickers’ infiltration of Honduras’ political class,” and confirms “long-held suspicions that Honduras’ current ruling party, like politicians such as (Juan Orlando) Hernández, was not immune to the influence of drug money just as campaigns for the 2025 elections are intensifying.”
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