Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I'd also like to join in welcoming you to our subcommittee, Mr. Main. I thought your testimony was very relevant.
As you may know, Henri-Paul Normandin, the director general of the Latin American and Caribbean bureau in our department of external affairs, testified before us on November 6. He made a statement to the effect that, “Reports of human rights defenders, journalists, and justice sector workers being targeted for intimidation and violence, including murder, continue.”
It's a statement that dovetailed with your testimony today.
He went on to say, and I quote, “the political situation in Honduras is more stable than it has been for several years.” He also indicated, “The new administration has also adopted a series of measures to improve security that appear to be leading to positive results.”
He identified nine reforms in that regard of which I will only excerpt three and ask if you might reply to those. First, in the matter of combatting impunity, he said that there had been reforms to the penal code increasing the penalty for the murder of judicial officials to life imprisonment, and the penalty for threatening government officials in the exercise of their duty to 20 years imprisonment.
A second one was the adoption of a national human rights policy and action plan, and a third was a willingness on the part of the government to work with multilateral human rights institutions, including by extending an invitation to the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to open an office in the capital of Honduras.
I'm wondering if you can comment on those particular reforms that he indicated had been undertaken by the Hernandez government, and whether you feel there have been these positive results that the director general stated in his testimony to us, though he acknowledged that it will take time to see if they are concretely fulfilled.