Zelaya, defying coup, plans return to Honduras

Source: Reuters

Zelaya, defying coup, plans return to Honduras
By Patrick Markey Patrick Markey – 12 mins ago

TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) – Defying a coup and bolstered by international support, ousted President Manuel Zelaya said he will return to Honduras on Thursday to serve out the rest of his term.

He said he would be accompanied by the Argentine and Ecuadorean presidents, and the U.N. General Assembly and Organization of American States chiefs.

But the interim government -- set up after the army bundled Zelaya out of the Central American country on Sunday -- said it would arrest him if he tried to re-enter Honduras.

In the Honduran capital several thousand protestors took to the streets to rally against Zelaya, a leftist leader ousted in a dispute over presidential term limits.

Zelaya told a news conference at the United Nations he intended only to complete his mandate, which ends in early 2010, and would not run for president ever again.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090630/wl_nm/us_honduras

They would never have moved without it. They are too dependent on the Pentagon.

US pentagon/government.

For me they are still one and the same.

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — The ousted president of Honduras says he will return home on Thursday with the president of the U.N. General Assembly, the head of the Organization of American States and the presidents of Argentina and Ecuador.

Miguel Zelaya told reporters after addressing the General Assembly on Tuesday that he wants to finish his four-year term, which ends on Jan. 27, and then will return to his previous life as a farmer.

Zelaya, who was forced into exile in Costa Rica after soldiers stormed his palace early Sunday morning, said he was going to fly to Honduras from Washington and arrive the same way he always has — as a citizen and as president.

He said his supporters and enemies will be there and the military will have to drop its opposition because there is no other possibility ...

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-06-30-honduras-...

Check this clip out of him saying he doesn't understand the contrast between Obama's reactions on Iran and Honduras.

http://progressnotcongress.org/?p=1979

Denounce the Human Rights Abuses in Honduras

WASHINGTON - June 30 - The situation in Honduras turned violent when over 10,000 people gathered in the streets to protest the coup Monday evening. Using tear gas, high-powered water and guns (it is still not clear whether soldiers were armed with rubber bullets or otherwise) many people were wounded and there has been one confirmed death in the capital, Tegucigalpa. In the capital, pro-coup marches are occurring, defended by the police and national guard. As of Tuesday morning, the resistance movement to the coup is gathering in Tegucigalpa, to determine how and where to take to the streets. Therefore, there is anticipation of violence today, as soldiers are expected to react violently today to protesters as they did yesterday.

Violence has also broken out outside of Tegucigalpa. In the interior of the country, especially in the state of Olancho, the military has been conducting home invasions in order to capture and detain youth. Many youth have fled to the mountains, and their whereabouts are unknown. The military is violently disbursing pro-Zelaya marches, and many protesters are missing. The local media is refusing to air any comments about the violence and human rights abuses taking place in the country, insisting that nothing is amiss. An international news crew from TeleSur was detained and beaten while broadcasting the oppression of protesters by the military.

Yesterday in a meeting of the Rio Group, President Zelaya reiterated that he is the only president of Honduras, and that he has not stepped down. He declared his plans to return to Honduras on Thursday, mostly likely accompanied by the Secretary-General of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza. Argentine president Cristina Fernandez also plans to accompany Zelaya on Thursday. The coup in Honduras has been unanimously condemned throughout the Western Hemisphere, and has also been condemned by the United Nations and European Union. Zelaya spoke on Tuesday in front of the United Nations.

Notably, two army battalions have refused orders from the coup government. They are the Fourth Infantry Battalion in the city of Tela and the Tenth Infantry Battalion in La Ceiba (the second largest city in Honduras), both located in the state of Atlantida.

The coup leaders include several well-known human rights abusers, such as the retired Captain Billy Fernando Joya Amendola, who was a member of the CIA-trained 3-16 batallion from 1984-91, one of the most notorious battalions noted for human rights abuses during that time.. Bertha Olivar, of COFADEH, calls the coup advisers a line-up of the "Galley of Terror". Furthermore, two coup leaders, Air Force Commander General Luis Javier Prince Suazo and Army General Romeo Vasquez Velasquez, were trained at the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC, Formerly known as the School of the Americas--SOA), a US army school located in Fort Benning, GA, whose graduates have been linked to some of the largest human rights atrocities in Latin America's history.

COFADEH (Comité de Familiares de Detenidos y Desaparecidos en Honduras or the Honduran Committee of Families of the Disappeared or Detained), a leading Human Rights group in Honduras, has gone hospital to hospital attempting to document the cases of violence and human rights abuses. They are conducting this documentation work because the national Human Rights Commission, headed by Ramon Custodio and the Fiscal (Attorney General), Sandra Ponce, have thus far refused to document and denounce human rights abuses since the coup began Monday morning and are fully supporting the coup government.

One of the first moves of the the army and de facto government was to cut electricity and telephone lines throughout most of the country. Later Monday two television channels were re-established, both of which maintained that Zelaya had voluntary resigned, the change of power was constitutionally legitimate and that the new President had the support of the majority of the Honduran people. Through TeleSur, a transnational South American television news station, the public in South America has been able to see on the ground footage of protests in Honduras as well as streamed footage from the Honduran pro-coup news stations. Hondurans within their country are much less informed than larger Latin America because the coup government has been able to stop TeleSur from broadcasting. Information is arriving to Honduran people about the whereabouts of President Manuel Zelaya and the vast international support he has by way of people from outside Honduras calling to cell phones of friends and family inside who are inside the country. The biggest issue now are human rights abuses inside the country.

http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2009/06/30-6

and dumped in another country and when a forged resignation is read in Congress, that is a coup.

I was just hoping some still knew how to use a dictionary.

under her bed to get out of the way of the gunfire.

This blow against the elected government seems to have been rejected pretty universally, inside Honduras and outside.

they are starting to show

For U.S. troops in Honduras, business as usual

Coup opponents clashed with the Honduran military in Tegucigalpa where the U.S. Embassy instructed Americans to stay off the streets, but the U.S. Southern Command reported it was business as usual Monday for hundreds of U.S. troops at two sites in Honduras.

No American forces were called back from the Soto Cano air base in Honduras, 60 miles from the capital, where about 600 U.S. forces serve on rotations.

The Pentagon has had a presence at Soto Cano since the 1980s, assisting air missions coming and going from Latin America. The hub typically gets busy for search-and-rescue operations during hurricane season.

"No more troops are coming here and none of us are leaving," reported Air Force Lt. Candace Park by telephone from Soto Cano on Monday morning.

Likewise, the U.S. Southern Command kept its group of military officers intact and on assignment at the U.S. Embassy, said Southcom spokesman Jose Ruiz from Miami. There were no plans for reinforcements or withdrawal in the capital, he said.

http://dailyme.com/story/2009062900008998/us-troops-hon...

Thanks for that link. It's a great place to start. :hi:

Transition of presidential power at dawn at gunpoint carried out by hooded army troops of a president still in his PJs who was then promptly flown to Costa Rica.

------------------

Just heard that Spain is calling for the withdrawal of ALL European ambassadors from Tegucigalpa. "Goriletti," or as Magbana says, "Pinochetti," must be feeling mightily lonely by now.

money is being planted in Zelaya's residence.

I heard this rumor earlier today.

Like it's going to help. :crazy:

no problem they will find money in the same place they'll search next week

that's how propaganda works

You can't honestly be defending what the Honduran right did here.

Maybe he'll explain in terms you can grasp what he meant when he said:

"We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras..."

He seems to have Bush-like popularity so I don't know why he wants to return. In the end the same result.

US treads careful path on Honduras
US President Barack Obama has called the removal of Honduran president Manuel Zelaya on Sunday a "coup".

The ousted leader has been meeting US officials in Washington.

But the US State Department has not recalled its ambassador from Tegucigalpa and it is still reviewing whether to cut off aid to Honduras.

So while Washington's reaction has been strong and swift, when it comes to statements, its actions have so far been measured.

This is a signal that Washington is not keen to use its clout to help Mr Zelaya return to power, shying away from any action that could be seen as interventionism in a region where the US has a long, complex history.

The reaction is also in line with the promise President Obama made to Latin America at the Organization of American States summit in April, not to dictate US policy on the continent anymore but to be an equal partner.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8127772.stm

They're probably booking their Miami hotel rooms right now.

like the poor Hondurans who fleet their country in search of a better live.

The poor support him. He's no Bush.

He needs to take back what is his. Fuck the army.	kestrel91316	Jun-30-09 05:33 PM	#1
Fuck them and whoever in our Army gave them the green light.	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 06:49 PM	#9
I would say	The abyss	Jun-30-09 08:02 PM	#14
Officials to return to Honduras with leader	struggle4progress	Jun-30-09 05:41 PM	#2
I've read that two army battalions have already stopped taking orders from the new gov't.	Alexander	Jun-30-09 05:44 PM	#3
Same here. Hope others will join them in this courageous decision. n/t	Judi Lynn	Jun-30-09 06:07 PM	#5
Joe Scarborough Doesn't Understand Foreign Policy	kevsters	Jun-30-09 05:48 PM	#4
Joe doesn't know where his own pecker is. n/t	bitchkitty	Jul-01-09 12:29 AM	#23
Denounce the Human Rights Abuses in Honduras	Judi Lynn	Jun-30-09 06:07 PM	#6
Why do they keep calling this event a 'coup' - nt	Tejas	Jun-30-09 06:38 PM	#7
Because when a sitting president is kidnapped in the night by hooded troops	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 06:48 PM	#8
Didn't ask for dramatic fiction, maybe	Tejas	Jun-30-09 07:13 PM	#10
That's literally what happened. Oh, and Zelaya's daughter had to climb	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 07:18 PM	#11
I was missing the coup's apologist	AlphaCentauri	Jun-30-09 08:07 PM	#16
I want to know the names of all the US COs on the ground in Honduras.	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 08:22 PM	#19
Now, now, we all know it was a ...	rabs	Jun-30-09 07:44 PM	#12
A constitutional lawyer speaking on Telesur just now said	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 08:30 PM	#20
yeah, they arrested him 2 day ago did not find nothing	AlphaCentauri	Jun-30-09 10:03 PM	#21
When the military overthrows a civilian democratic president, it's a coup.	Ken Burch	Jul-01-09 06:42 AM	#24
Why not contact President Obama concerning your deep, gnawing honest questions?	Judi Lynn	Jul-01-09 12:23 PM	#27
Very sad, the whole situation.	Kurska	Jun-30-09 07:53 PM	#13
My guess is the Honduran Congress will impeach him	Mudoria	Jun-30-09 08:05 PM	#15
The UN will take care of it	AlphaCentauri	Jun-30-09 08:10 PM	#17
There won't be enough of the rats left to do anything.	EFerrari	Jun-30-09 08:13 PM	#18
I'll guess those rich suckers will get visas not TPS	AlphaCentauri	Jun-30-09 10:07 PM	#22
He'll have a lot more popularity once this is over.	David__77	Jul-01-09 12:01 PM	#26
Zelaya is a third world thug. He's lucky he wasn't hung. n/t	OllieLotte	Jul-01-09 11:22 AM	#25
You stand out like a sore thumb. Time to retool?	Poll_Blind	Jul-01-09 12:45 PM	#28