TEGUCIGALPA – Honduras and the United States are planning to install a military base in the indigenous section of Honduras’ Caribbean coast to combat drug trafficking, according to Honduran military sources.
The chief of the Honduran Armed Forces, Gen. Romeo Vázquez, said the governments of both countries are planning to build the base in a remote section of the Moskito Coast, near the northern border of Nicaragua.
The area slated for the base is the department of Gracias a Dios, a 20,000-kilometer swath of dense jungle that is accessible only by air or boat. Because of its geographical remoteness, it has become an area of heavy drug trafficking, according to government sources.
“The zone is conflictive and isolated, so we are making this effort to maintain a greater presence in the area to better control the region,” Gen. Vázquez said.
No date has been announced for construction of the base.
