Honduras President says he did not smuggled cocaine to the US

Honduras President Juan Orlando Hernandez has denied allegations by a US prosecutor that he helped smuggle tons of cocaine into the United States.

New York prosecutor Jacob Gutwillig said in federal court on Tuesday during the alleged Honduran drug dealer Geovanny Fuentes that Fuentes paid Hernandez $ 25,000 in bribes.

"How can anyone believe false testimony that I was dealing with drug dealers," Hernandez wrote on Twitter on Thursday.

Gutwillig claims that accountant Jose Sanchez attended in 2013 and 2014, where Fuentes paid Hernandez's money.

Sanchez had to tell the jury in New York about "the shock, the fear he felt when he saw the accused sitting with the president," Gutwillig said.

The witness worked at a rice company through which Fuentes laundered money, the prosecutor alleges.

Sanchez will testify that Hernandez told Fuentes "they would transport so much cocaine to the US that they would push the drugs into the noses of the gringos," Gutwillig said.

Hernandez, a lawyer who came to power in January 2014 and is in his second term, has declared himself a champion in the fight against drugs.

US prosecutors consider him a co-conspirator with Fuentes but have not charged him.

The Honduran government said Wednesday night that photos shown during the trial, in which Fuentes' family members are seen with Hernandez, were taken during a public event for the president's birthday during the 2017 election campaign.

The president's brother, Tony Hernandez, was convicted of large-scale drug trafficking in a New York trial in 2019.

Prosecutors say he was the middleman between the accused trader Fuentes and the president.

President Hernandez was linked to drug trafficking during his brother's trial by Leonel Rivera, a Honduran drug gang leader called Los Cachiros.

"It's a proven fact that Los Cachiros was trying to reach an agreement with the US," Hernandez tweeted.

"The false testimony of drug dealers is obvious lies."

Rivera began testifying Wednesday, telling the jury in New York that he worked with Fuentes from 2011 to 2013 until they fought and the alleged trader tried to kill him.

Rivera gets a life sentence plus 30 years in prison but hopes it will be reduced in exchange for his testimony.

He worked with the US Drug Enforcement Administration for two years before surrendering to US authorities in 2015.

Rivera was a collaborative witness for the US government in other major drug trafficking trials in New York, including that of President Hernandez's brother.

During the trial of Tony Hernandez, Rivera said the president received millions of dollars in bribes from drug dealers to protect shipments of cocaine to the United States.