Tuesday, August 25, 2026

Lawmakers received a sweeping bill on August 24 to prevent child sexual abuse, speed up reporting, and coordinate the response among institutions across Honduras, where officials report an average of 26 sexual assaults a day, 75% of them involving minors.

Congress will debate bills to expand consular services for Hondurans in the US, provide free hypertension medication, adapt to climate change, and teach CPR in schools, along with infrastructure projects and a pending vote on electricity-sector reform.

The national electric utility, ENEE, will cut power on August 25 in neighborhoods across Francisco Morazán, Comayagua, and Cortés departments for maintenance, equipment installation, and private-company work, with most outages lasting six hours.

Also reported by: Once Noticias

Guanaja's mayor says the town is rebuilding concrete bridges damaged by natural disasters, remodeling a school, and working with the national power company to repair generators and add a new one to end nightly blackouts of three to four hours.

Honduras's metropolitan region has logged 96 suspected and 32 confirmed whooping cough cases, six deaths, and three infants under one year old in intensive care through epidemiological week 32, with health authorities urging vaccination for children under five and pregnant women.

As severe drought drains Tegucigalpa's reservoirs, roughly 30% of the capital's residents who lack a connection to the public water system must buy water from unregulated tanker vendors at up to 50 times the piped rate, squeezing poor households.

A magnitude 4.4 earthquake centered near Roatán in the Bay Islands struck on August 24 at 9:13 p.m., with no immediate reports of injuries or damage.

Olancho FC goalkeeper Gerson Argueta publicly accepted responsibility for a last-minute mistake that cost his team a win over Olimpia in the fourth round of the Liga Hondubet, saying his teammates and staff backed him rather than pointing fingers.

Honduran forward Bryan Róchez scored in the fourth minute for Leixões SC against União de Leiria on August 22, but his team gave up the lead and lost 4–2 in Portugal's Second Division.

Three men were shot dead in different neighborhoods of Yorito on the night of August 23, spreading fear among residents who reported hearing gunfire across the town.

Also reported by: Once Noticias

Security Minister Gerson Velásquez said human trafficking is happening across Honduras, with recent investigations showing that relatives—including parents—have been implicated in selling or exploiting children in cases documented in Choluteca and Olancho departments.

Roatán will receive 50 new police officers, investigators, and a forensic laboratory backed by the Security Ministry and the Public Ministry, in response to recent incidents and the island's growth as a major tourism destination.

Twenty-six Mexican nationals deported from the United States are staying temporarily at Honduras's migrant reception center in San Pedro Sula while they complete consular paperwork to return to Mexico, part of a larger flow of 365 Mexican deportees Honduras has received and assisted since the start of the year.

Honduras's criminal investigation agency, ATIC, has given Libre party coordinator Manuel Zelaya 48 hours to detail the party's national structure, reviving a 2018 complaint Zelaya filed against military authorities after FUSINA labeled Libre-affiliated groups as terrorist cells.

Congress spending climbed in May to L11.4 million on advertising and L20.6 million on Mother's Day gift baskets handed out across all 18 departments, drawing criticism from Criterio.hn over the lack of detail on who received them and how they were allocated.

The National Registry of Persons will begin issuing the new child identity document, the DINNA, in May 2027, after enrolling minors in schools through April 2027; the card will carry biometric data and be kept by parents rather than children.

Honduras's two-month vehicle tax amnesty, which waives penalties and interest on unpaid annual vehicle fees through 2025, expires today, with more than 45,000 owners already taking part and generating L51.8 million in collections.

The Central Bank auctioned $91.6 million in a foreign-exchange operation on August 24, setting a weighted average exchange rate of L26.8518 per dollar for August 25.

A survey of nearly 5,500 Honduran children aged 9 to 17 found that one in five spends four to eight hours a day on social media, with psychologists warning that excessive device use fuels attention problems, anxiety, and depression.

Honduras's nursing union, Aneeah, is pressing the Health Ministry to halt layoffs and pay salaries owed since January, with other debts dating to 2022, and has paused its protests while awaiting a meeting with the ministry.

The Agriculture Ministry is weighing silver-iodide cloud seeding with private companies and international partners to spur rainfall over the next two months across drought-hit areas, including the dry corridor and Tegucigalpa.

The Tegucigalpa municipal government extended its water emergency to December 15 amid severe drought and critically low levels in the reservoirs that supply the capital.

A Liberal Party congressman has proposed declaring the football field in La Ceiba's La Isla neighborhood a cultural heritage site in recognition of its historical importance to the community.

Honduran winger Andy Najar scored in the 95th minute to complete Nashville SC's comeback win over Columbus Crew, raising his season tally to two goals and three assists.

Honduras is asking the U.S. for a transition period before TPS holders must leave, with a delegation set to meet U.S. officials in early September, while at least 385 deportees arrived this week on three flights to San Pedro Sula.

The Public Ministry's anti-drug directorate and the Armed Forces seized a bundle of 20 packages of suspected cocaine on a Choluteca beach, found abandoned at the shoreline in black wrapping typical of maritime drug trafficking by organized crime.

Also reported by: Once Noticias

A Honduran court acquitted Alexander "Chande" Ardón, a former mayor deported from the United States, of money laundering after finding technical and mathematical errors in the prosecution's financial analysis of his allegedly unexplained assets.

Also reported by: La Prensa, HCH

A young man was found dead floating in Jucutuma Lagoon in San Pedro Sula with his hands and feet bound; police are investigating and trying to identify him.