On Tuesday, the regime that ousted Manuel Zelaya in Honduras claimed that the deposed president permitted tons of cocaine to be flown into the Central American nations on its way to the United States of America.

Foreign Minister Enrique Ortez told CNN en Espanol that, "every night, three or four Venezuelan-registered planes land without the permission of appropriate authorities and bring thousands of pounds ... and packages of money that are the fruit of drug trafficking. We have proof of all this. Neighboring governments have it. The DEA has it."

Rusty Payne, a spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Agency, said in Washington D.C. that he could neither confirm nor deny a DEA investigation.

Meanwhile, Mr. Zelaya is touring the United States and could not immediately reached for comment to respond to the allegations when he was travelling from New York to Washington.

The Houston Chronicle reports that, "in an interview Tuesday evening with The Associated Press in Tegucigalpa, interim Hunduran President Roberto Micheletti was asked about Ortez's allegations and said only that it would be up to prosecutors to present any evidence."

In recent years, Honduras and other Central American countries have become major transshipment points for Colombian cocaine, especially as Mexico's government cracks down on cartels.

The drugs enter into Honduras on noncommercial aircraft, and, increasingly in speed boats, from Venezuela and to a lesser extent Colombia, as revealed by the Key West, Florida-based Joint Interagency Task Force-South, which coordinates drug interdiction in the region. the boats have a tendency to make short hops up Central America's coast.

According to the Chronicle, "in its most recent report on the ilicit narcotics trade, the U.S. State Department said in Friday of Hunduras that 'official corruption continues to be an impediment to effective law enforcement and there are press reports of drug trafficking and associated criminal activity among current and former government and military officials."

To read the entire article from the Houston Chronicle, link here:  To read about the Joint Interagency Task Force South, link here:  To read a White House statement about Mr. Zelaya, link here:

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