World Notes HONDURAS

Retired General Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, former head of the Honduran armed forces, left his fortress-like home in Tegucigalpa's posh Florencia Norte district just after 10 a.m. His driver was taking him to purchase a Bible and visit his brother. At an intersection three blocks away, as many as six guerrillas toting submachine guns sprayed Alvarez's car with bullets as he pleaded, "Don't do this to me!" The left-wing Popular Liberation Movement, known as the Cinchoneros, claimed responsibility for the deaths of Alvarez and his driver.

Some speculate that Alvarez, a staunch anti-Communist, was targeted for his role in turning sections of Honduras into bases for the U.S. military and the U.S.-backed contras, who have been fighting to topple the Sandinista regime next door in Nicaragua. Cinchoneros leaders indicated they were avenging Alvarez's brutal attempt to crush their movement in the early 1980s, as well as the former general's part in the disappearance of 120 alleged subversives. Whatever the motive, Hondurans fear that growing political violence could turn their once placid nation into the Lebanon of Latin America.