Document #1084616
IRB – Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (Author)
No information on activities of the
Cinchonero movement prior to March 1981 is presently available to
the IRBDC. A database search for information on Mr. McBroon was
unsuccessful. The Movimiento Popular de Liberación
"Cinchoneros" (MPL) was formed by students at the National
Autonomous University in 1978, and named after an "early 20th
century peasant leader Serapio Romero, called `el Cinchonero.'" [
"Killings Marks Return of Cinchoneros", Latin American Weekly
Report, 9 February 1989, p. 2.] The movement initially
maintained political links with the pro-Soviet Communist Party of
Honduras (PCH), [ Henry Degenhardt, ed, Revolutionary and
Dissident Movements, (Essex: Longman, 1988), p. 147.] but later
became the armed wing of the People's Revolutionary Union (URP)
when the URP split from the PCH in 1980. [ Ciar n O Maol in, ed.,
Latin American Political Movements, (Essex: Longman, 1985),
pp. 167, 163.]
For your information, a chronology of some
of the activities of the Cinchonero movement from 1981 to the
present follows.
The Cinchoneros are accredited with the
March 1981 hijacking of a Sahsa airlines flight, which resulted in
the release of 15 people (including a Salvadorean FDR leader) in a
hostage exchange. [ "Killing Marks Return of Cinchoneros".] In
September 1982, the Cinchoneros attempted to negotiate the release
of 70 more "detained and disappeared" persons in a hostage taking
incident in the San Pedro Sula chamber of industry and commerce. [
Ibid. ] In April 1983, the Cinchoneros joined five other groups to
form the United National Directorate (Directoria Nacional Unido,
DNU). [ Henry Degenhardt, Revolutionary and Dissident
Movements, (Essex: Longman, 1988), p. 147.] The government
responded to a bombing campaign by the Cinchoneros in La Ceiba, San
Pedro Sula and La Lima in August 1983 with a major
counterinsurgency operation by the "secret Battalion 3-16 created
by General Alvarez, and by the end of the year the Cinchoneros were
officially pronounced defunct." ["Killing Marks Return of
Cinchoneros".] However, the Cinchoneros conducted a short bombing
spree in Tegucigalpa (the Capital) in late 1984, [ "Honduras:
Cinchoneros resurface", Latin American Regional Reports : Mexico
and Central America, 23 March 1989, postscript.] and in 1986,
reports of a Cinchonero resurgence in the interior led to a renewed
counter-insurgency campaign by the government. [ Amnesty
International, Honduras: Civilian Authority - Military
Power, (London: Amnesty International, 1988), p. 11.] At the
beginning of 1988, Sergeant Vilorio, an agent of the National
Bureau of Investigation, and named as a member of Battalion 3-16,
was found assassinated with a Cinchonero banner attached to his
body. [ Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras,
Human Rights in Honduras; A Special Report on the Situation of
Civil and Political Rights January-June, 1988, September 1988,
p. 7. It is not known for certain if the Cinchoneros did, in fact,
commit the murder, because Vilorio was a witness in a case in which
he could give damaging evidence to superior officers in Battalion
3-16.]
The Cinchoneros resurfaced in 1989,
claiming responsibility for the 25 January 1989 assassination of
General Gustavo Alvarez, [ "Rebels Claim Responsibility" and
"Communique on Alvarez' Death", Daily Report: Latin America,
26 January 1989, p. 24.] the ex-Minister of Defense deposed in
March 1984. [Americas Watch, Human Rights in Honduras after
General Alvarez, (New York: Americas Watch Committee, 1986), p.
3.] On 7 March, three small bombs containing Cinchonero leaflets
exploded in San Pedro Sula. [ "MPL Rebels Explode Bombs in San
Pedro Sula," Daily Report: Latin America, 10 March 1989, p.
38.] The leaflets "urged the government to respect human rights,
expel the U.S. troops, end social injustice, and solve the foreign
debt and the country's foreign deficit." [ Ibid.] Another report
contained in the Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily
Report: Latin America, alleges that the Cinchoneros are
"receiving military training on the Apaji Cattle Farm...3 km west
of Ocotal" in Nicaragua. [ "Honduran Guerrillas Reportedly Train on
Farm, Daily Report: Latin America, 3 April 1989, p. 30.]