Pat Dollard | Young Americans

And once again, what has Obama done about all of this? You guessed correct, absolutely nothing! If Obama is willing to indirectly support men like Manuel Zelaya and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, what do you think this means about his foreign policy, let alone his motives for doing so?

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) - The Organization of American States Wednesday gave Honduras 72 hours to reinstate deposed President Manuel Zelaya or face suspension from the group, ahead of the ousted leader’s planned talks here with US officials.

The organization’s general assembly instructed Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza to undertake “diplomatic initiatives aimed at… the reinstatement of President Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales,” within the next three days.

If these efforts prove fruitless, Honduras will be barred from the OAS, in keeping with group’s charters, according to a communique.

Tensions have flared in Honduras since Zelaya was deposed in an army-backed coup on Sunday and swiftly flown out of the country. The coup was the first in the major banana and coffee exporter in more than 20 years.

The OAS said it was “gravely concerned about the political crisis in the Republic of Honduras as a result of the coup d’etat” which it said “has produced an unconstitutional alteration of the democratic order.”

Zelaya, who was elected in 2005 to a non-renewable four-year term, was due to hold talks in Washington Wednesday with US officials, one day ahead of his planned return to his Central American nation of 7.5 million people.

His meetings in the US capital come as a growing list of nations pulled their ambassadors from Tegucigalpa, with Spain the latest country to recall its envoy.

Protests erupted Tuesday for the second day in the Honduran capital, when unidentifed attackers hurled a grenade, which failed to explode, at the Supreme Court.

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TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) - Honduras’ interim leader warned that the only way his predecessor will return to office is through a foreign invasion, even as the hemisphere’s leaders gave him 72 hours to hand over the presidency.

One potential confrontation was postponed Wednesday when the ousted president delayed plans to return—to a threat of arrest. Another loomed as hundreds of Manuel Zelaya’s supporters, some armed with baseball bats and bottles of gasoline, blocked the street before the country’s presidential palace.

Roberto Micheletti said in an interview with The Associated Press late Tuesday that “no one can make me resign,” defying the United Nations, the OAS, the Obama administration and other leaders that have condemned the military coup that overthrew Zelaya.

Pressure continued to grow Wednesday as Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman announced that joint U.S.-Honduran military operations are on hold “as we assess that situation.”

The U.S. has close relations with Honduras’ military and it has some 800 personnel at a Honduran air base used for anti-drug and other operations.

The U.N. General Assembly Tuesday to demand Zelaya’s immediate restoration, and the Organization of American States said Wednesday that coup leaders have three days to restore Zelaya to power or Honduras risks being suspended from the group.

That period for negotiation prompted Zelaya to announce he was putting off his plans to return home on Thursday until the weekend.

Micheletti vowed Zelaya would be arrested if he returns, even though the presidents of Argentina and Ecuador have agreed to accompany him, along with the heads of the OAS and the U.N. General Assembly.

Micheletti’s foreign minister, Enrique Ortez, said Wednesday that while Zelaya would be detained, “we will let his companions enter if they represent friendly countries. If not, no.”

Micheletti, a member of Zelaya’s Liberal Party who was named interim leader by Congress following the coup, said Zelaya “has already committed crimes against the constitution and the law.”

“He can no longer return to the presidency of the republic unless a president from another Latin American country comes and imposes him using guns,” said Micheletti, who shrugged off intense international pressure.

“No one can make me resign if I do not violate the laws of the country,” Micheletti said. “If there is any invasion against our country, 7.5 million Hondurans will be ready to defend our territory and our laws and our homeland and our government.”

He did not name any country, but Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Sunday that he had put his military on alert. Chavez said his country’s ambassador had been briefly detained and roughed up and warned that if Venezuelan Embassy was attacked, Honduras “would be entering in a state of war.”

Chavez said Tuesday that any aggression against Zelaya by Micheletti’s government should prompt military intervention by the United Nations.

Soldiers stormed Zelaya’s residence and flew him into exile early Sunday after he insisted on trying to hold a referendum asking Hondurans if they wanted to reform the constitution. The Supreme Court, Congress and the military all deemed his planned ballot illegal.

Zelaya backed down from the referendum Tuesday, saying at the United Nations that he would no longer push for the constitutional changes he wanted.

One of several clauses that cannot be legally altered in the Honduran constitution limits presidents to a single, 4-year term. Congress claims Zelaya, whose term ends in January, modified the ballot question at the last minute to help him eventually try to seek re-election.

“I’m not going to hold a constitutional assembly,” Zelaya said. “And if I’m offered the chance to stay in power, I won’t. I’m going to serve my four years.”

OAS Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza said the OAS ultimatum is meant “to show clearly that military coups will not be accepted. We thought we were in an era when military coups were no longer possible in this hemisphere.”

France and Spain announced Wednesday they are recalling their ambassadors from Honduras as part of international efforts to reinstate Zelaya.

Young men wearing black T-shirts imprinted with the face of revolutionary icon Che Guevara used boulders, signposts and metal sheets yanked from fences to block all streets leading to the presidential palace on Wednesday, just hours after soldiers took down their own barricades and allowed traffic to flow.

The faces of the Zelaya supporters were covered by bandannas and they had armed themselves with tree branches, metal poles and glass bottles filled with gasoline.

Thousands of rival demonstrators supporting Micheletti packed the city’s central plaza on Tuesday.

A small homemake explosive detonated outside the Supreme Court late Tuesday and another went off near the offices of Radio America, whose coverage has been sympathetic to Micheletti. Police would not comment on either explosion, but witnesses said neither caused injuries or major damage.

Some hospitals and schools remained closed due to walkouts by teachers and medical staff who support Zelaya, but life was little changed in most of the capital.

“We still have to go to work, despite what happened with the government,” said Manfredo Brizzio, a tour operator who said he supports Zelaya.

Asked if he was willing to protest in the streets, Brizzio replied: “I don’t have time.”

Zelaya’s popularity has sagged in recent years, but his criticism of the wealthy and policies such as raising the minimum wage have earned him the loyalty of many poor Hondurans.

Ortez threw a wild card onto the table on Tuesday, telling CNN en Espanol that Zelaya had been letting drug traffickers ship U.S.-bound cocaine from Venezuela through Honduras. Ortez said the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration was aware of Zelaya’s ties to organized crime.

DEA spokesman Rusty Payne could neither confirm nor deny a DEA investigation.

The U.S. government stood firmly by Zelaya, however. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Washington saw no acceptable solution other than Zelaya’s return to power. He said the United States was considering cutting off aid to Honduras, which includes $215 million over four years from the U.S.-funded Millennium Challenge Corporation.

The World Bank also said it was freezing loans.

“If living in democracy implies living with fewer resources, Hondurans will adjust to the situation,” Micheletti’s Finance Minister Gabriela Nunez said Wednesday.

Micheletti said he had no contact with any U.S. official since assuming the presidency.

The interim leader, who now occupies the same office in the colonial-style presidential palace that Zelaya did, insisted he was getting on with the business of governing.

He and his newly appointed Cabinet ministers were settling in, even as soldiers wandered the ornate hallways and manned barricades outside to keep Zelaya’s supporters away.

Micheletti, who promised he would step down in January and had no plans to ever run for president, said a key goal of his short term in office would be fixing the nation’s finances. Zelaya never submitted the budget to Congress that was due last September, raising questions about what he was spending state money on.

Asked if Zelaya could one day return to power stronger than ever, Micheletti said that “it’s not about sympathy, it’s not about being a martyr, but simply that we are following the letter of the law which he did not respect.”

The Washington Post:

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras, June 30 — The two presidents of Honduras were headed on a collision course Tuesday, as the president ousted by a coup vowed to return and his replacement threatened to arrest him the minute he lands.

Neither side seemed willing to bend in a looming confrontation that is the first test of the Obama administration’s diplomacy and clout in the hemisphere.

Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, removed from office Sunday in a military-led coup, addressed the U.N. General Assembly in New York on Tuesday and said he would fly back to Honduras on Thursday, accompanied by the head of the Organization of American States.

But the newly appointed interim president of Honduras, Roberto Micheletti, warned that if Zelaya returns, he will be arrested, tried and sent to prison for years. Micheletti’s claim on the presidency is seen as illegitimate by the international community.

“If he comes back to our country, he would have to face our tribunals and our trials and our laws,” Micheletti said in an interview with The Washington Post at his residence in the hills overlooking the capital. “He would be sent to jail. For sure, he would go to prison.”

Micheletti said he did not see any way to negotiate with the Obama administration and international diplomats seeking a return of Zelaya to power because, Micheletti insisted, Zelaya was guilty of crimes against the country.

“No, no compromise, because if he tries to come back or anyone tries to bring him back, he will be arrested,” Micheletti said.

At the United Nations, Zelaya told the assembly, “I’m going back to calm people down. I’m going to try to open a dialogue and put things in order.”

Zelaya, whose politics moved to the left during his three years in office, has become close to Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who has been the most vocal and belligerent critic of the coup, threatening to “overthrow” the new government.

“When I’m back, people are going to say, ‘Commander, we’re at your service,’ and the army will have to correct itself,” Zelaya told the assembly. “There’s no other possibility.”

Yet other possibilities do exist. Thousands of Hondurans rallied Tuesday in the central plaza of the capital, Tegucigalpa, to support the forced removal of Zelaya and to shout their support for the armed forces.

“It would be a disgrace to have him back in the country,” said Emilio Larach, owner of a large building materials company here, who attended the rally to denounce Zelaya. “He created hate among the Honduran people. Everyone in the government was against him.”

As the rally was underway, a small, anxious but growing group of Honduran lawmakers sought to build a coalition to endorse a compromise measure to allow for Zelaya’s return. According to one participant in the talks, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of derailing the negotiations, the compromise would include a general amnesty for everyone involved, including the coup leaders and members of the military, while Zelaya would have to abandon his plan to hold a referendum that could lead to a change in the Honduran constitution.

Critics have charged that Zelaya in his nonbinding referendum was seeking a change in the constitution that would allow him to serve for more than one term as president.

The lawmakers seeking a compromise, however, have not yet begun to work with U.S. diplomats here, according to U.S. Embassy press officer Chantal Dalton. “They haven’t been in contact with us,” Dalton said. “This is smoke and signals. Nobody here has heard anything.”

At the United Nations, Zelaya said he would agree not to push his referendum. “I’m not going to hold a constitutional assembly,” he said. “And if I’m offered the chance to stay in power, I won’t. I’m going to serve my four years.”

Zelaya, a wealthy rancher and timber baron, said he would go back to his farm after his term ends in January. “I come from the countryside, and I’m going to go back to the countryside,” he said.

The streets of Tegucigalpa were calm Tuesday, though the city is awash in rumors that Venezuela is marshaling forces for a possible invasion.

Micheletti cautioned the world that his army was on alert and prepared to defend the country. Honduran reservists have been called to their barracks to donate blood.

“Our army also consists of 7.5 million people prepared to defend freedom and liberty,” said Micheletti, who stressed that Hondurans are a peaceful people.

Media outlets friendly to Zelaya have been shut down, and some reporters are hiding — as are a dozen members of Zelaya’s former cabinet. Most Hondurans must rely on newspapers and television stations that support the coup. Cable news outlets such as CNN en Español have occasionally been blacked out, though it is still possible to get outside news via satellite.

Micheletti and his supporters insist that the world does not understand what happened here. They say that Zelaya was found guilty by a Supreme Court tribunal, that his arrest by the military was legal and that Zelaya was attempting to circumvent Honduras’s Congress and courts by staging the referendum.

The interim president said he thought his country could hold out long enough for world opinion to turn its way. Venezuela has said it would suspend oil shipments, and Honduras’s neighbors — El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua — announced that they would stop overland trade.

“That is why I want to make a call to our allies in the United States, that they should stick with us at this very important moment in the life of the country,” Micheletti said. “The economy of our country is completely destroyed — because of the acts of the former government. If aid [from the United States and Europe] keeps coming, we will show that every little penny that we borrowed will be spent for the people of this country.”

Micheletti promised that Honduras would hold presidential elections in November and that a new president would take office in January. Micheletti, who is a leader of the Liberal Party, the same party that Zelaya belongs to, vowed that he would not run for president.

Micheletti also said that Zelaya is a master at bending world opinion his way. Another source in the government here said that Zelaya actually was wearing a crisply ironed dress shirt when he was sent into exile in Costa Rica, but that he changed to a white T-shirt to show how he was hustled out of his official residence at dawn while still in his pajamas.

Senior Obama officials said that an overthrow of the Zelaya government had been brewing for days and that they worked behind the scenes to stop the military and its conservative, wealthy backers from pushing Zelaya out. That the United States failed to stop the coup gives anti-U.S. leaders such as Chávez room to use events in Honduras to push their vision for the region.

Zelaya is an unlikely hero for the left, coming from Honduras’s wealthy classes and joining a leftist bloc of Latin American countries several years after he had been elected president. But his ouster has changed the dynamics.

“Zelaya didn’t have a strong constituency,” said Larry Birns, director of the Washington-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs, a policy group. “And this has become a recruiting mechanism for Zelaya. It’s the best thing that could have happened to Zelaya because it’s allowed him to generate support.”

Carlos Sosa, Honduras’s ambassador to the OAS, said in a telephone interview that on Thursday he would likely join Zelaya on a flight that would leave from a U.S. airport — he wouldn’t say which one — and land in Tegucigalpa. “Everyone wants to go,” he said, noting that the secretary general of the OAS, José Miguel Insulza, and other leaders would be on that flight.

BOGOTA (AP) – The regime that ousted Manuel Zelaya in Honduras claimed Tuesday that the deposed president allowed tons of cocaine to be flown into the Central American country on its way to the United States.

“Every night, three or four Venezuelan-registered planes land without the permission of appropriate authorities and bring thousands of pounds … and packages of money that are the fruit of drug trafficking,” its foreign minister, Enrique Ortez, told CNN en Espanol.

“We have proof of all of this. Neighboring governments have it. The DEA has it,” he added.

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration spokesman Rusty Payne in Washington said he could neither confirm nor deny a DEA investigation.

Zelaya was traveling from New York to Washington and could not immediately be reached to respond to the allegations.

Honduras and other Central American nations have become major transshipment points in recent years for Colombian cocaine, particularly as Mexico’s government cracks down on cartels.

The drugs arrive in Honduras on non-commercial aircraft from Venezuela and increasingly in speedboats from Colombia, according to the Key West, Florida-based Joint Interagency Task Force-South, which coordinates drug interdiction in region.

In its most recent report on the illicit narcotics trade, the U.S. State Department said in February of Honduras that “official corruption continues to be an impediment to effective law enforcement and there are press reports of drug trafficking and associated criminal activity among current and former government and military officials.”

The report did not name names.

Drug-related violence appears to be up in Honduras.

Homicides surged 25 percent from some 4,400 in 2007 to more than 7,000 in 2008 while more than 1,600 people were killed execution-style, suggesting drug gang involvement, according to the Central American Violence Observatory.

In October, Zelaya proposed legalizing drug use as a way of reducing the violence, and doubling the country’s police force, which reached 13,500 last year, up from 7,000 in 2005, according to the State Department report.