Kidnapped Honduran Cartoonist

I heard this morning that my friend and editorial cartoonist Allan McDonald has been kidnapped in Honduras, forced into exile and all his cartoons destroyed. A friend had direct email contact with him and he confirmed to her that the below story is completely true and accurate. He is currently going with his family to seek safety in another country.

I lived in Honduras for two years and know the cartoonist personally. His website is here and the letter I received is below.

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Kidnapping and detainment of Allan McDonald and his 17 month old daughter, April. (translated on 6/30/09 by Marla Conrad)

To all -

Through this letter I am communicating to you that at 11 am in the time of Sweden and at 3 am in the time of Honduras, Allan McDonald, the Honduran cartoonist, communicated with me by Chat saying that he had been detained by the Honduran Armed Forces in a hotel. His house was ransacked and his cartoons and drawings were burnt in a bonfire en his home in Santa Lucia. He was detained with his 17 month old daughter who had not eaten and was only given water.

The communication did not last even 5 minutes and he was communicating via a portable with little battery that belonged to the accredited consul of Venezuela in Honduras who was also detained together with him, and next to them were two female journalists, a Spaniard and a Chilena, whom he did not know. He also told me that he was with the Honduran journalists Eduardo Maldonado and Esdras Amado Lopez, but they had been taken away to an unknown place.

At the moment that Allan was saying goodbye, he said resist and denounce this deed, I've only seen this in the television when there was a coup in 1973. The communication was cut off because he said "they're coming for us". Apparently, they would be driven in a bus and taken out of the country through the border of El Espino, in this moment the destination and whereabouts of Allan McDonald, his daughter April and heir companions were ignored.

This letter is the denouncement, and also a call to awareness, it is not possible that there are some that are applauding this coup and the deprival of the most elemental rights of our population. This period seemed to be overcome but we have gone backwards to the decade of the 80's en a clear disregard of human rights which also reflects the small democratic vocation or our political class.