The FINANCIAL — Talks to resolve the political crisis in Honduras broke down on July 20 when coup leaders rejected a compromise plan to reinstate the ousted president, Manuel Zelaya. Zelaia vowed to return home despite warnings from a defiant de facto government; he plans to march across the border from Nicaragua, surrounded by thousands of his followers, to reclaim the presidency taken from him on June.
According to Bloomberg, Micheletti, backed by the Honduran Supreme Court, Congress and military, refuses to allow Zelaya to return for the remainder of his term that ends in 2010 even as the international community isolates the Central American country in response to the June 28 coup. A counter-proposal from Micheletti’s delegation said Zelaya could come home only to face a tribunal.
The decision revived the possibility that Zelaya, who is in neighbouring Nicaragua, will try to storm back into Honduras to rally supporters and topple his usurpers. Minutes after the talks collapsed he told Reuters. "Absolutely no one can stop me [from returning]. I'm a Honduran. It is my right."
Speaking on July 19to a raucous crowd that had gathered in the capital of Nicaragua to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Sandinista revolution, Zelaya's foreign minister, Patricia Rodas, called on his faithful to join the “great march against oppression,” as reported Miami Herald.
''Together we will march and recover and reconquer what belongs to each one of our patriots,'' Rodas said.
''Zelaya is planning to walk across the border, in a peaceful civic act,'' he said. The president hopes to be joined by about half a million of his supporters.
Reuters gives information that a police spokesman on July 19 appealed to children and the elderly to stay away from protests planned for this week, saying the security forces would "not be tolerant with anyone who acts like a terrorist in our country".
"I have no doubt that this will raise the tension levels," said Efrain Diaz, a political analyst with the Center for Human Development, a Honduran non-governmental organization. "We could see violence if Zelaya tries to return by force, according to the same source. Costa Rican President Oscar Arias fretted that the collapse could lead to bloodshed and he called on the two sides to give him another 72 hours to try and solve the worst crisis in Central America since the Cold War.
Arias, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987 for helping to end Cold War-era conflicts in Central America, said any accord must begin with the reinstatement of Zelaya. The crisis began when Zelaya was awakened by troops and sent into exile after he ignored court orders to reinstate the military chief and suspend a poll aimed at changing the constitution, as Bloomberg reported.
The US and most Latin American leaders had prodded both sides into four days of on-off mediation talks in Costa Rica brokered by Arias, as Guardian informs. Arias proposed that Zelaya return this week to head a coalition government and serve the end of his term before presidential elections in October, a month earlier than planned.
Envoys for the interim president, Roberto Micheletti, accepted parts of the plan but balked at allowing their rival back into power. "I'm very sorry, but the proposals that you have presented are unacceptable to the constitutional government of Honduras," said Micheletti's envoy, Carlos López., according to the same source.
Arias said he would keep working on a solution for the next three days. ''What is the alternative to dialogue?'' Arias asked after Sunday's talks. “We could face a civil war and bloodshed that the people of Honduras do not deserve,'' Miami Herald reported.
The same source gives information that the last time Zelaya attempted to enter Honduras, on July 5, the army blocked the airport and kept his airplane from landing. As his supporters scaled a fence around the tarmac, shots were fired and one teen died. That has been the only confirmed death during the three-week crisis, but some fear Zelaya's return will bring more bloodshed.
''If Zelaya comes across the border with armed supporters, then the military will have to respond,'' said political analyst Jorge Yllescas, according to Miami Herald. Even if Zelaya enters peacefully, the orders for his arrest make a confrontation inevitable, he said. “Just his mere presence here would make the country ungovernable. He must understand the kind of damage he would do to the country.''
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