Military police guard the entrance to the National Penitentiary Center in Tamara, on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, June 26, 2023. (PHOTO / AP)
TEGUCIGALPA – Honduras' military began taking control of the country's prisons on Monday, following a gang dispute that left 46 inmates dead at a women's detention center last week, officials said.
President Xiomara Castro announced last week she would hand the military police control of the prison system, as her administration seeks to stop organized crime activity inside prisons.
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Official video showed hundreds of shirtless male inmates, many tattooed and with their heads shaved, arranged on the floor of Honduras' high-security Tamara prison with their arms over their heads, guarded by heavily armed soldiers.
Our mission is to defeat organized crime inside the prisons and we are (also) going after the intellectual authors operating from outside.
Jose Manuel Zelaya, Defense Minister
"Our mission is to defeat organized crime inside the prisons and we are (also) going after the intellectual authors operating from outside," Defense Minister Jose Manuel Zelaya said in a tweet.
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Tamara is one of two prisons, along with La Tolva, that the military police assumed control over on Monday, Armed Forces spokesperson Antonio Coello said.
Military police on Monday seized pistols, machine guns, ammunition, magazines and grenades from an area of the Tamara prison occupied by the Barrio 18 gang, Colonel Fernando Munoz told reporters.
"The corruption in the prisons is over. We are going to control it and there will be no calls coming out of here to order extortions or executions," the officer said in a press conference.
