Honduran police used tear gas and water cannons to crush a protest staged by hundreds of teachers demanding the payment of salaries in arrears for more than 7,000 teachers, the extra month's salary paid at Christmas and vacations.

Members of the Special Operations Command dispersed participants in a peaceful demonstration on Tuesday outside the Ministry of Finance, in downtown Tegucigalpa, according to latribuna.hn website.

The source said that as they felt the effect of gases and water, some 200 teachers had to vacate the street to resume traffic, which they had blocked for several minutes on Tuesday, and then they gathered near the Ministry of Finance, where they stayed until midday.

None of these people will afford eating a sandwich, either because they have not been paid their salaries since February or have not been paid their month's salary for Christmas, said President of the College of Teachers of Honduras, Joel Almendarez, who criticized the Executive.

"What we have is gases and contaminated water; so what we can see is that the Government of Porfirio Lobo is not able to manage resources and State finances properly," said Almendarez.

Also on Tuesday, Education Minister Alejandro Ventura said that the Ministry of Finance already made money transfers to national banks to pay the teachers' salaries and Christmas pay.

He denied that the government owed salaries to more than 7,000 teachers, and announced that the payment for December will be made on Thursday and Friday this week.

http://www.plenglish.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=461850&Itemid=1