ABSTRACT
Constitution, which specified that the incumbent President would remain in office until 1943; subsequent attempts by the PL and other opponents of the Government to depose Carías were all unsuccessful. 1939: The legislature extended, until 1949, the presidential term of Carías, who proceeded to rule Honduras as a dictatorship. 10 October 1948: In presidential elections Juan Manuel Gálvez, of the PN, was elected unopposed. 1951: The Organization of Central American States was founded by Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. 10 October 1954: Dr José Ramón Villeda Morales, the leader of the PL, won most votes in elections to the presidency, but lacked a majority, prompting a political crisis, as the main parties failed to agree on how to proceed; Julio Lozano Díaz, the incumbent VicePresident, subsequently suspended the legislature and declared himself President, Gálvez having left the country. 21 October 1956: Lozano Díaz was overthrown by a military junta. October 1957: The PL secured a majority in Congress. November 1957: Villeda was elected as President of Honduras. 8 January 1959: The Central American Common Market, comprising El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and later Costa Rica, came into force. 3 October 1963: Villeda was overthrown in a military uprising led by Col (later Gen.) Oswaldo López Arellano, the Minister of Defence. June 1965: López was appointed President, following elections held on the basis of a new Constitution. June 1969: Ill-feeling concerning the treatment of football supporters during three World Cup qualifying round matches between the El Salvador and Honduras national teams resulted in the countries suspending diplomatic relations. About 12,000 Salvadorean migrants resident in Honduras were expelled. 3-18 July 1969: Military skirmishes between Salvadorean and Honduran armed forces culminated, on 14 July, in Salvadorean troops advancing some distance into Honduras. After the intervention of the Organization of American States (OAS), a cease-fire was agreed on 18 July. A final peace treaty was not signed until 1980, and the underlying territorial dispute, which was referred to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 1986, was not resolved until 1992. About 2,000 people were killed in the conflict, which is sometimes known as the ‘Football War’. 28 March 1971: The PN narrowly won presidential and congressional elections, and Dr Ramón Ernesto Cruz Uclés became President. 4 December 1972: Cruz was deposed in a bloodless coup d’état, and former President López was reinstalled as head of state. September 1974: Some 10,000 people were killed as a result of Hurricane Fifi, which also severely damaged the Honduran economy. 31 March 1975: At the instigation of the military, López was replaced as Commanderin-Chief of the Armed Forces by Col (later Gen.) Juan Alberto Melgar Castro.
