WASHINGTON (CNS) -- A group of Catholic and other human rights advocates said that since their country's 2009 coup, Hondurans have struggled with human rights abuses, and they encouraged the U.S. Congress to refuse to cooperate with the Honduran government.

"What we have now is the leftovers of a state," said Berta Olivia from the Committee of Relatives of the Detained and Disappeared in Honduras, one of the three delegates who spoke at a briefing March 23 for congressional staff.

Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., sponsored the session on Capitol Hill with visiting human rights delegates from Honduras to discuss their charges of police repression of teachers, political activists, journalists and human right defenders.

Olivia, along with the other two delegates, urged the United States to cut financial support for government institutions, particularly the police. She asked that the United States help prevent Honduras from rejoining the Organization of American States, which promotes social and economic development in the Western Hemisphere.

The OAS condemned Honduras' 2009 coup and suspended its membership. Olivia also urged that a commission made up of members of Congress visit the country to see the persecution and violations of human rights.

In June 2009, President Manuel Zelaya was forced from office, arrested at his home before dawn one morning under an arrest warrant issued by the Supreme Court. Zelaya was put on a plane to Costa Rica, and Roberto Micheletti, speaker of Congress, took his place. The complaints against Zelaya centered on his efforts to begin to rewrite the constitution, in part to do away with presidential term limits, which would not have affected him. President Porfirio Lobo was chosen during the regularly scheduled election in January 2010.

Violence has increased during ongoing protests by teachers who, according to The Associated Press, demanded their six-month back pay and opposed a law that would give parents oversight of schools. On March 18, a group of Honduran teachers marched in the streets of the capital, Tegucigalpa, calling for Lobo to meet their demands. One teacher, 59-year-old Ilse Ivana Velasquez, was hit in the face by a tear-gas canister. She later died of her injury.

Olivia said a report was made four hours after Velasquez was killed, calling her death an accident. Within 19 hours, a man was arrested and a trial was set. But according to the delegation, the police themselves were responsible.

"We think that everything that is taking place is not an accident," said Judge Guillermo Lopez, one of three judges who were removed from court after speaking out against the Lobo administration.

Lopez said the government should have known that someone could be injured or killed with the use of tear-gas bombs.

"It is the responsibility of the police because they caused the repression and they fenced in the protestors," said Lopez, who said he believes the government punishes those who speak out for democracy.

Since Lobo became president, the delegation said, 463 people have died, including 30 "campesinos," or peasants, 10 journalists and 17 teachers, with more than 150 people in self-imposed exile.

"Never in the history of Honduras have so many teachers been assassinated," said Olivia.

Lopez said Honduras was in a "state of defenselessness." Tear gas was being used among crowds that included people ranging in age from 2 months to 70 years old and water cannons were used to push back protesters.

The Committee of Relatives has been completely overwhelmed with the number of claims of human rights violations, Olivia said. She said her group had presented 702 complaints to the attorney general, but none had been addressed.

Journalists have also felt the pressure from the government and are leaving the country, said Lucy Mendoza, a member of the staff of the Jesuit-sponsored ERIC Institute in Honduras. The Team for Reflection, Investigation and Communication, known by its acronym in Spanish, ERIC runs a community radio station in El Progreso, Honduras, which was temporarily shut down in 2009 amid the presidential crisis.

On March 18, a group from the station was intercepted and violently searched by the military even after they identified themselves as journalists, Mendoza said.

Radio stations are a primary means of communication among the country's poor population, and members of the delegation visiting the Hill said they believe that's why journalists are attacked.

The delegation urged those at the briefing to remember the threats to liberty and justice, Hondurans endure.

"The regime only dialogues with those who support (them), but there is no dialogue or bridge with the opposition," said Lopez.

Calls from Catholic News Service to McGovern's office to ask about what follow-up was planned after the briefing with delegation were not returned.

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