Contra Reports in Honduras

* Juanita Darling, in “Tales of 1980s Brutalities by Contras Arise in Honduras” (Oct. 27), notes that “gleaning information from U.S. documents has been difficult, with page after page censored with a black marking pen.” About half of the declassified material concerning Father James Carney, the priest who disappeared in Honduras in 1983, is blacked out. The U.S. government must be more cooperative in releasing more information concerning Carney and the other disappeared persons of Honduras.

The CIA inspector general’s report on CIA activities in Honduras in the 1980s, released in 1998, stated: “[blank] according to [blank], during the 1980 to 1984 period when executions had been carried out, each execution had to be approved by the Honduran Armed Forces Commander and the president of Honduras” (page 165 of the report). If Carney was captured alive, a hypothesis which the CIA says it cannot rule out, did the Honduran president approve killing him?

Along with other friends and relatives of Carney, I note with interest the fact that the Honduran government has initiated the process of excavations at El Aguacate, the former military base where remains of political prisoners may be found. We urge the Honduran attorney general to continue this investigation and to bring it to a successful conclusion, finding the remains of Carney and of another U.S. citizen, David Arturo Baez Cruz, at El Aguacate or wherever they may be.

FATHER JOSEPH MULLIGAN

Managua, Nicaragua