Honduras vowed Wednesday to withdraw from an extradition treaty with the United States that has been used to imprison drug traffickers, accusing the Biden-Harris administration of meddling in Honduran-Venezuelan relations.
"The interference and interventionism of the United States, as well as its intention to manage the politics of Honduras through its embassy and other representatives, is intolerable," leftist President Xiomara Castro wrote in a post on X.
"They attack, ignore and violate with impunity the principles and practices of international law, which promote respect for the sovereignty and self-determination of peoples, non-intervention and universal peace. Enough."
Castro's government is a staunch ally of Venezuela, which is under pressure from the U.S. and other countries after the disputed reelection of President Nicolas Maduro.
Castro said she asked Honduran Foreign Minister Enrique Reina to "denounce" the country's extradition treaty with the United States. Under international law, a denunciation is a unilateral act by a party seeking to terminate its participation in a treaty.
In a post on X, Reina wrote, "Madam President @XiomaraCastroZ I have proceeded to comply with your order immediately, sending Note No. 111-DGAJTC-2024 through which we officially communicated the denunciation to the US Government of the extradition treaty between Honduras and the US."
Reina added a copy of the order in his post.
The extradition agreement is considered a key tool to dismantle a "narco-state" that, according to U.S. authorities, was built in Honduras when Juan Orlando Hernandez was president from 2014-2022.
Fifty Hondurans accused of drug trafficking have been extradited to the United States over the past decade, including Hernandez, who was sentenced in June in New York to 45 years in prison.
The row comes after Laura Dogu, the U.S. ambassador to Honduras, voiced concern about a meeting between Honduran authorities and Venezuelan Defense Minister Gen. Vladimir Padrino Lopez, who is under U.S. sanctions.
Dogu told reporters that she was surprised to see Honduran Defense Minister Jose Manuel Zelaya and the country's military chief sitting next to a "drug trafficker" in Venezuela.
Reina described the ambassador's remarks as a "direct threat to our independence and sovereignty."
Honduran officials visited Venezuela to attend the World Cadet Games sports competition, he noted.
Honduras was one of the few Latin American countries that congratulated Maduro on his disputed reelection on July 28.