ckaihatsu
22nd July 2009, 04:14
El Organizador <[email protected]> Tue, Jul 21, 2009 at 7:57 PM
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Zelaya's Decision to Return to Honduras Raises the Stakes in the Struggle for Democracy and Sovereignty
By ALAN BENJAMIN
July 21, 2009 -- In an interview published today in La Nación, the main daily newspaper in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Manuel Zelaya, the deposed president of Honduras, announced publicly that he will "initiate [his] return to Honduras beginning Wednesday [July 22] by any of the border entry points with Guatemala, El Salvador or Nicaragua." (quoted in Agencia de Noticias EFE)
Zelaya spoke to the Argentine paper from the Honduran Embassy in Nicaragua, where he has been living since he was airlifted from his presidential home last June 28, while still in pyjamas, by U.S.-trained military troops.
Zelaya told La Nación that, "the mediator [Costa Rican President Oscar Arias] gave the putschists 72 hours to accept the mandate of the Organization of American States (OAS), meaning the reinstatement of Honduras' legitimate president. That 72-hour deadline is up tomorrow, Wednesday."
Earlier this week, Roberto Micheletti (or "Pinocheletti, as he is known in Honduras), the man installed in the presidency by the organizers of the military coup, told the press that while he agreed with many of Arias's proposals, he and his "government" could not accept reinstating Zelaya as president. "Zelaya can come back as a private citizen," Micheletti said, "and stand trial for his decision to violate the Constitution" -- a reference to Zelaya's proposed June 28 referendum on a Constituent Assembly that would rewrite the Constitution.
Zelaya stated in his interview with La Nación that "while [he] accepts the seven points of the Arias settlement, as a starting point for an agreement, those who have violated this agreement are the putschists when they rejected the main point put forward by Arias: the return of Honduras' legitimate president."
Zelaya continued: "The people of Honduras are moving to the borders so that when the 72-hour deadline is up, we can return through one of the border entry points that I mentioned. Our return will be huge. ... It is now clear that the coup plotters are not going to give up the power that they won through violence. This is not surprising, as they are the representatives of an oligarchy that has exploited our country for decades. They are the ones responsible for the civil war that is already shedding the blood of our people."
Zelaya's decision to return to Honduras raises the stakes in the struggle for democracy and sovereignty in Honduras.
Without a doubt, the Arias Plan -- imposed by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton [see background articles below] -- is a violation of the Honduran people's right to self-determination. The plan calls for Zelaya's return to office, but on the condition that he form a "government of national reconciliation" with the coup plotters and that he renounce his call for a National Constituent Assembly to rewrite Honduras' Constitution. Such a plan has been denounced loudly by union and political leaders and activists across the Americas.
The June 28 coup, in fact, was organized by the Honduran military -- with the aid of powerful military and business interests in Washington -- to prevent the proposed referendum by Zelaya on the Constituent Assembly. Zelaya argued that the Honduran constitution was designed to protect the interests of the oligarchy and the super-rich at the expense of the country's working class and peasant majority. The referendum was to consult the people on whether or not they favored convening a Constituent Assembly to rewrite the Constitution in the interests of the Honduran people.
Support for Zelaya's plan was -- and remains -- overwhelming among the people, who are tired of "free trade" agreements that impose sweatshop conditions on working people and destroy all national industry. They are tired of living in poverty, while a small minority of oligarchs own the overwhelming majority of the cultivable lands. They want a real agrarian reform and real development. They want to put an end to the mass exodus of more than 1 million Hondurans to the United States and other countries. They want to get rid of the U.S. military base stationed only 60 miles from Tegucigalpa, the capital city.
While Zelaya said he agreed with the Clinton-Arias "mediation," he also issued a statement in Managua on July 15, on the eve of the 30th anniversary of the Nicaraguan Revolution, in which he called upon the people of Honduran to "rise in insurrection -- with general strikes, mass civil disobedience, road blocks, and more -- to oust the military coup plotters and ensure the immediate return of Honduras' legitimate president."
And this sentiment to defend Honduras's democracy and sovereignty by any means necessary -- including by insurrection -- is clearly the will of the majority of the people of Honduras.
For more than three weeks now, the people of Honduras have been mobilizing in the streets -- in defiance of the military -- to demand the immediate and unconditional return of Zelaya.
Last July 16 and 17, the National Resistance Front (Frente Nacional de Resistencia) staged yet another nationwide general strike, with mass demonstrations and road-blocks in all major cities and towns.
On July 5, when Zelaya attempted to return to Honduras -- a return that was prevented by the Honduran military, who blocked the runways at the airport -- as many as 500,000 gathered at the airport to receive their returning president. In a country of only 7 million people, this is an enormous percentage of the population.
The Popular Bloc (Bloque Popular) and National Resistance Front have called for another two-day nationwide strike this coming Thursday and Friday. The movement from below has been growing with each passing day.
And the movement in support of the Honduran people is exploding across the Americas.
On July 16, at a conference that brought together trade union leaders from across the hemisphere in San Jose, Costa Rica, a decision was reached to organize mass protests in all major cities across the continent to demand that all governments break diplomatic relations with the Micheletti and that Zelaya be allowed to return without any conditions.
The president of the National Coordinating Committee of Trade Unions of Costa Rica, Jorge Coronado, announced that these protests were also being staged to protest the "gall of [Costa Rican President] Arias to 'mediate' an unacceptable deal, at the behest of the U.S. administration, that dares to put on the same footing a government democratically elected by the people and a so-called government that emanated from a military coup."
The revolutionary movement that is sweeping Honduras is showing no signs of letting up.
As Patricia Rodas, the deposed Minister of Foreign Relations of Honduras, told a rally in La Paz, Bolivia, on July 16, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Bolivia's independence, "At this very moment, the army of millions of Honduran citizens hold in their hands the destiny of all the nations and peoples of Latin America."
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Alan Benjamin is editor of The Organizer Newspaper and national organizer of Socialist Organizer.
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BACKGROUND ARTICLES FROM THE INTERNATIONAL PRESS
http://www.japantoday.com/category/world/view/zelaya-prepares-return-to-honduras-as-talks-stall
Zelaya prepares return to Honduras as talks stall
Monday 20th July, 03:04 PM JST
MANAGUA, Nicaragua -
Ousted President Manuel Zelaya held out hope for a negotiated solution to Honduras' deepening political crisis even after talks in Costa Rica fell apart, but vowed to prepare the way for his return to power regardless of their outcome.
Zelaya accused his opponents of "making a mockery" of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias' attempts to mediate an agreement and called for stronger international pressure on the government of Roberto Micheletti, the interim president sworn in by Honduras' congress after a June 28 coup.
Singling out the United States repeatedly, Zelaya said the international community risks tacitly endorsing the putsch if it does not confront the interim government that abducted and deposed him at gunpoint.
"The international community is facing a dilemma," Zelaya told reporters at the Honduran Embassy in the Nicaraguan capital late Sunday. "They asked the guerrilla movements 20 years ago to put down their arms. ... And now the conservatives come back and take up arms to boot out the leftists who are attempting a process of reform."
Arias, the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize laureate for brokering an end to Central America's civil wars, proposed a plan that would let Zelaya serve out the final months of his term, move up elections by one month to late October, grant a general amnesty and include representatives of the main political parties in a reconciliation government.
The Micheletti government endorsed several of those proposals on Sunday-but his foreign relations secretary, Carlos Lopez, rejected the overall plan, specifically citing the issue of Zelaya's return to power.
A counterproposal suggested Zelaya could return as a regular citizen-to be tried in court. Honduras' Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya before the coup, ruling that his effort to hold a referendum on calling for a constitutional assembly was illegal.
Many Hondurans viewed the referendum as an attempt by Zelaya to push for a socialist-leaning government similar to the one his ally Hugo Chavez has established in Venezuela.
Zelaya, a wealthy rancher who shifted left during his presidency, charged that the current constitution protects a system of government that excludes the poor.
The aftermath of the coup is turning into a major test of Latin American democracy and of the Obama administration's policy toward the region.
The U.S., the United Nations and the Organization of American States have demanded that Zelaya be reinstated, and no foreign government has recognized Micheletti.
In Washington, OAS chief Jose Miguel Insulza said Sunday that the international community continues to support Zelaya's return to power, and the Micheletti government needs to confront that reality.
"This is a coup that failed," Insulza told a news conference.
But further isolating impoverished Honduras, even Zelaya's allies concede, puts the country's stability at further risk.
Arias promised further efforts to seek a solution, and Vilma Morales, a negotiator for the interim government, said talks could resume Wednesday.
"Dialogue is not broken," she told the AP.
Zelaya, who previously vowed to go back to Honduras and set up a parallel government if the talks failed, left open the possibility that talks could bear fruit. But he said he would push forward with organizing "resistance" inside Honduras to prepare for his eventual return. He did not give details.
The Honduran military thwarted Zelaya's first attempt to fly home on July 5 by blocking the runway at the airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa.
"Next weekend we will have everything necessary to make our return," he said late Sunday in Managua. "The social pact in Honduras is broken; the military broke it."
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Associated Press writers Marienela Jimenez and Diego Mendez in San Jose, Costa Rica, and Mark Stevenson in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, contributed to this report.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/latinamerica/articles/2009/07/20/tensions_rise_as_honduran_crisis_talks_fail/
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Pressure grows on Honduras, violence feared
By Simon Gardner and Esteban Israel | July 20, 2009
TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) - Honduras' de facto leader came under increased pressure on Monday to hand power back to the ousted president with Washington threatening to cut aid and Latin American leaders warning of bloodshed if he does not back down.
Efforts to broker an end to the power struggle in Honduras following a June 28 military coup collapsed on Sunday after interim leader Roberto Micheletti rejected a proposal to reinstate overthrown President Manuel Zelaya.
Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, the frustrated peacemaker in the talks, asked both sides to give him until Wednesday to broker a solution to the crisis. But Micheletti, who was appointed by Honduras' Congress after the coup, remained defiant despite being shunned by foreign governments.
"My position is unchangeable," he said in a speech on Monday at the presidential palace to a standing ovation.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held a "very tough phone call" with the caretaker president, warning him he could face cuts in economic aid unless he strikes a deal with his enemy, spokesman P.J. Crowley said.
"She reminded him about the consequences for Honduras if they fail to accept the principles that President Arias has laid out, which would (have) a significant impact in terms of aid and consequences, potentially longer-term consequences ..., for the relationship between Honduras and the United States," he said.
It was not clear what sanctions might apply but the options include slashing $180 million in economic aid.
The United States has already halted $16.5 million in military aid and multilateral lenders have put another $200 million on hold.
The European Commission also tightened the screws on Micheletti, suspending all budgetary support payments to Honduras. It had earmarked 65.5 million euros ($92.73 million) in payments in the 2007-10 period.
Latin American leaders fear violence in the impoverished Central American country unless Micheletti steps aside.
"Insurrection and confrontation are not a good path to take, but I don't think we will avoid it unless the de facto government shows some flexibility," said Jose Miguel Insulza, the chief of the Organization of American States.
The United States and other governments pleaded with Zelaya to wait out the 72 hours requested by Arias before staging a return to Honduras from exile in Nicaragua.
Zelaya says resistance is being organized in Honduras to pave the way for his return this weekend, despite the de facto government's threats to arrest him. The government has imposed a night-time curfew.
Zelaya tried to fly back to Honduras earlier this month but soldiers blocked the runway and at least one protester was killed in clashes with the army.
Pro-Zelaya protesters gathered peacefully outside Congress on Monday but protest leader Juan Barahona said they planned highway blockades on Wednesday and union leaders called for a national strike on Thursday and Friday.
"This is just the start. For now, these are peaceful protests but things could get a lot worse," said Wilfredo Moncado, a 59-year-old union leader who joined the march.
A DIFFERENT COUP
Zelaya was expelled from the textile and coffee exporting country in his pajamas in the middle of the night. He had upset his political rivals by trying to lift presidential term limits and the army toppled him after the Supreme ordered his arrest.
The crisis is widely seen as a litmus test for U.S. President Barack Obama as he seeks a fresh start with Latin America despite ideological differences with vocal U.S. foes like Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a close ally of the deposed Honduran leader.
Micheletti has a base of local support in business circles as well as the Supreme Court, Congress and the Catholic Church, making this coup unlike those that battered Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s.
On Monday, he urged business leaders to continue investing in Honduras and asked his supporters to help him try to turn the tide of world opinion in his favor.
Analysts say he is biding his time so that Zelaya's reinstatement becomes a moot point. His term was due to end in January, and elections were scheduled for November.
(Additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa, Juan Casas and John McPhaul in San Jose, Tim Gaynor in Washington and Rodrigo Martinez in Santiago; Writing by Louise Egan; Editing by Kieran Murray)
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http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS-World-Rest-of-World-Honduras-talks-break-down-over-Zelayas-return/articleshow/4797187.cms
Honduras talks break down over Zelaya's return
AP 20 July 2009, 08:58am IST
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica: Talks on resolving Honduras' leadership crisis broke off Sunday after the interim government rejected a proposed compromise, saying a provision calling for ousted President Manuel Zelaya to serve out his term was "unacceptable."
Zelaya accused his opponents of "making a mockery" of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias' attempts to mediate a solution and called for stronger international pressure on the government of Roberto Micheletti, the interim president sworn in by congress after the June 28 coup.
"They have made a mockery of even (US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham) Clinton," Zelaya said. It was Clinton who invited Arias to mediate.
The two sides remained deadlocked on the issue of Zelaya's return after a fourth day of negotiations, but Arias promised renewed efforts to seek a deal and avoid bloodshed in the Central American country.
"It was not possible to reach a satisfactory agreement. The Zelaya delegation fully accepted my proposal, but not that of Mr Roberto Micheletti," Arias said.
He added that he will spend the next three days "working much harder to see if we can reach an agreement, because what is the alternative to dialogue?"
On Saturday, Arias proposed a plan that would let Zelaya serve out the final months of his term, move up elections by one month to late October, grant a general amnesty and include representatives of the main political parties in a reconciliation government.
Arias, the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize laureate for brokering an end to Central America's civil wars, had urged patience from Zelaya and flexibility from the interim government, which has ruled since the military whisked Zelaya out of the country at gunpoint.
The Micheletti government endorsed several of his proposals on Sunday, but his foreign relations secretary, Carlos Lopez, rejected the overall plan, specifically citing the issue of Zelaya's return.
"Dear mediator ... I'm very sorry, but your proposals are unacceptable," Lopez said at a news conference after the talks. Arias' compromise, he added, "interferes with Honduran internal affairs."
The government that deposed Zelaya offered instead to create a truth commission to "let the Honduran people and the international community see all the acts that led to the current situation," according to a letter signed by Lopez. It refused to budge on its insistence that Zelaya would be arrested and prosecuted if he returns, guaranteeing only that he would be given "due process."
Lopez told CNN en Espanol that his delegation would return to the Costa Rican capital on Wednesday "to continue our conversations."
But Enrique Flores, a negotiator for Zelaya, said that while Arias may continue "personal efforts" to reach an agreement, formal talks are over.
"Today, the dialogue ended," Flores said. Zelaya, who previously vowed to go back to Honduras and set up a parallel government if the talks failed, left open the possibility that talks could bear fruit. But he said he would push forward with organizing "resistance" inside Honduras to prepare for his eventual return, though he did not give details.
"Next weekend we will have everything necessary to make our return," he told reporters late Sunday in the Nicaraguan capital, Managua. "The social pact in Honduras is broken; the military broke it."
The Honduran military thwarted Zelaya's first attempt to fly home on July 5 by blocking the runway at the airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa.
The coup is a major test of Latin American democracy and of the Obama administration's policy toward the region. The US, the United Nations and the Organization of American States have demanded that Zelaya be reinstated, and no foreign government has recognized Micheletti.
In Washington, OAS chief Jose Miguel Insulza said Sunday that the international community continues to support Zelaya's return to power, and the Micheletti government needs to confront that reality.
"This is a coup that failed," Insulza told a news conference. Honduran labor groups supporting the ousted president called for a general strike Thursday and Friday.
And in Nicaragua, Zelaya's foreign minister Patricia Rodas called for a massive march if mediation fails. She attended the 30th anniversary celebrations of the Sandinista revolution there on Sunday.
Honduras' Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya before the coup, ruling that his effort to hold a referendum on calling for a constitutional assembly was illegal.
Many Hondurans viewed the referendum as an attempt by Zelaya to push for a socialist-leaning government similar to the one his ally Hugo Chavez has established in Venezuela.
Zelaya, a wealthy rancher who shifted to left during his presidency, charged that the current constitution protects a system of government that excludes the poor. But he never specified what changes he wanted to make.
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Obama's Bullish Behavoir in Latin America
Honduras and the Big Stick
By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF
Liberals who have idealized Obama don't want to believe that their President is capable of bullish behavior towards Latin America. It was Bush, they say, who epitomized arrogant U.S.-style imperialism and not the new resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Recent events in Central America however force us to look at the Obama administration in a sobering new light. While it's unclear whether Obama had advance warning of an imminent military coup d'etat in Honduras the White House has not emerged from the Zelaya affair unsullied.
In December, 2008, even before his inauguration, Obama received an irate letter from Honduran president Manuel Zelaya demanding an end to arrogant and interventionist U.S. ambassadors in Tegucigalpa. Just eight months earlier American ambassador Hugo Llorens had taken on the government by making inflammatory remarks. During a press conference the diplomat declared that Zelaya's move to rewrite the constitution was "a Honduran matter and it's a delicate matter to comment on as a foreign diplomat." But then, contradicting himself and inserting himself into the volatile political milieu, Llorens remarked that "one can't violate the constitution to create a constitution, because if you don't have a constitution the law of the jungle reigns."
If Obama was serious about restoring U.S. moral credibility world-wide he might have cleaned house by removing Bush appointees such as Llorens. An émigré from Castro's Cuba, Llorens worked as an Assistant Treasurer at Chase Manhattan Bank before entering the Foreign Service. As DeputyDirector of the Office of Economic Policy and Summit Coordination in the State Department during Clinton-time, he played an important role in spearheading the corporately-friendly Free Trade Area of the Americas or FTAA. But it was chiefly during the Bush years that Llorens distinguished himself, serving as the Director of Andean Affairs at the National Security Council. At the NSC, Llorens was the most important advisor to Bush and Condoleezza Rice on matters pertaining to Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Peru, and Ecuador.
While Zelaya's move to rewrite the Honduran constitution antagonized Llorens it also inflamed the local business elite and no doubt the U.S. foreign policy establishment. Perhaps these groups feared a Honduran repeat of the South American "Pink Tide": across the region leftist leaders from Hugo Chávez to Rafael Correa have mobilized civil society in an effort to rewrite their respective nations' constitutions.
Chávez's 1999 constitution provides for some of the most comprehensive human rights provisions of any constitution in the world while also including special protection for women, indigenous peoples and the environment. The constitution moreover allows for broad citizen participation in national life. The preamble states that one of the Constitution's goals is to establish a participatory democracy achieved through elected representatives, popular votes by referendum and, perhaps most importantly, popular mobilization. In Venezuela, it was Chávez's constitution which helped to solidify his alliance with traditionally marginalized sectors of the population.
In Ecuador, traditional political parties and wealthy elites labeled Correa "dictatorial" after the president called for the drafting of a new constitution. In the end however a large plurality of voters approved the new 2008 constitution which provides for free universal health care, a universal right to water and prohibition of its privatization and the redistribution of large unused landholdings. Even more dramatically, the constitution declares that Ecuador is a "pacifist state" and outlaws foreign military bases on Ecuadoran soil.
As I explain in my recent book Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left (Palgrave, 2008), there's been a potent alliance as of late between leftist Latin leaders on the one hand and dynamic social movements on the other. In Ecuador, the main indigenous federation supported the new constitution as did organized labor. Indeed, Correa's move to draft a new constitution could help to establish tighter links between the president and progressive social forces as per Chávez's Venezuela.
In the media, the Honduran imbroglio has been depicted as a struggle over presidential power and term limits. But while any new constitution might have extended presidential term limits, such a reform could have also led to new progressive amendments to the law and further radicalization on the ground. In recent years Honduras has seen the emergence of a vibrant social and political scene including labor, Garifuna (Afro-Honduran people) and Indians. If Zelaya had been successful at pushing through his constitutional reform he would have been able to mobilize such groups.
What is the connection between U.S. interests and constitutional reform? If you had any doubt about Washington's true intentions in Honduras consider the following AP Report for July 8 about diplomatic negotiations between the coup regime and ousted president Zelaya: "Clinton would not discuss specifics of the mediation process, which she said would begin soon, but a senior U.S. official said one option being considered would be to forge a compromise under which Zelaya would be allowed to return and serve out his remaining six months in office with limited powers [italics added]. Zelaya, in return, would pledge to drop his aspirations for a constitutional change."
It's the State Department then under Hillary Clinton, allied in spirit to figures from the old Bush establishment, which is seeking to cut off constitutional reform in Honduras --- reform which could lead to popular mobilization as we've seen in Ecuador and Venezuela. Obama meanwhile has condemned the coup but his failure to rein in either Llorens or Clinton suggests that he too believes that Zelaya's proposal for a constitutional reform is dangerous and needs to be halted.
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Nikolas Kozloff is the author of Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2008) Follow his blog at senorchichero.blogspot.com
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July 19, 2009
Democracy hangs by a thread in Honduras
The right-wing coup d'état is faltering, but its supporters have powerful friends in Washington. Hugh O'Shaughnessy reports
The international group of right-wingers who staged the coup d'état against the democratic government of Honduras on 28 June are watching their plot fast unravel. There is stiffening international opposition to their protégé, Roberto Micheletti, who, in his capacity as President of Congress, ordered President Manuel Zelaya to be expelled from the country by plane in his pyjamas.
Mr Zelaya gave negotiators meeting in Costa Rica until midnight yesterday to restore him to office, threatening to secretly return to Honduras and attempt to retake power on his own if no agreement is reached. He indicated he would reject any power-sharing deal, and, at a news conference at the Honduran embassy in Nicaragua, said: "I am going back to Honduras, but I am not going to give you the date, hour or place, or say if I'm going to enter through land, air or sea."
As the Acting President's support shrinks at home, the plotters are lobbying to have Mr Micheletti shored up from abroad by means of a declaration of legitimacy from the US Congress. That scheme is not prospering. Enrique Ortez Colindres, the supremely undiplomatic octogenarian appointed foreign minister by Mr Micheletti, has had to resign, but not before he called Barack Obama "a negrito who knows nothing about anything", on Honduran television.
For some of the plotters it is their second attempt to overthrow an elected reformist government in Latin America: the group includes prominent figures involved in the 2002 ousting of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who was kidnapped for 48 hours and sent to a Caribbean island before being restored to office after widespread popular protest.
The temporary toppling of Mr Chavez was welcomed by the Bush administration, the Blair government and the International Monetary Fund. This weekend, the US seems destined for a replay of 2002's Operation Chaotic Coup. Amid a stream of contradictory messages it is clear that last month's putsch against Mr Zelaya was brewed up in Washington by a group of extreme conservatives from Venezuela, Honduras and the US. They appear to have hidden their plans from the White House, but hoped eventually to bounce President Obama into backing them and supporting the "interim president". They are making much of Mr Zelaya's alliance with Mr Chavez, whose sense of nationalism challenges US hegemony.
Financial backing for the coup is identified by some as coming from the pharmaceutical industry, which fears Mr Zelaya's plans to produce generic drugs and distribute them cheaply to the impoverished majority in Honduras who lack all but the most primitive health facilities. Others point to big companies in the telecommunications industry opposed to Hondutel, Honduras's state-owned provider. Parallels are being made with ITT, the US telecommunications company that offered the Nixon government funds for the successful overthrow of President Salvador Allende of Chile in 1973.
A key figure is Robert Carmona-Borjas, a Venezuelan active against Mr Chavez in 2002, who later fled to the US. He runs the Washington-based Arcadia, which calls itself "an innovative 'next generation' anti-corruption organisation". Its website carries three video clips alleging, without evidence, that Mr Zelaya, his associates and Hondutel are deeply corrupt. Behind Arcadia are the US-funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED)and the International Republican Institute (IRI), the well-funded overseas arm of the Republican Party. Currently active among the Uighurs of western China, the NED has this year funnelled $1.2m (Ł740,000) for "political activity" in Honduras.
The focus of attention in the campaign against Mr Zelaya is now on the office of Senator John McCain, the defeated US presidential candidate, who is chairman of the IRI, takes an interest in telecoms affairs in the US Congress and has benefited handsomely from campaign contributions from US telecoms companies - which are said to have funded the abortive 2002 coup against Mr Chavez.
Mr McCain's former legislative counsel, John Timmons, arranged the visit of Micheletti supporters to Washington on 7 July where they met journalists at the National Press Club "to clarify any misunderstandings about Honduras's constitutional process and ... the preservation of the country's democratic institutions".
Meanwhile, within the US administration, difficulties in co-ordination have emerged between the State Department and the White House, with the Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, issuing a low-key condemnation of the coup which was quickly superseded by stronger words from Mr Obama. The President called for Mr Zelaya's reinstatement, which Mrs Clinton had failed to demand.
The conservative-minded Mrs Clinton retains John Negroponte, an ambassador to Honduras under Ronald Reagan, as an adviser. He also represented George W Bush at the UN and in Baghdad. Democratic Senator Chris Dodd attacked Mr Negroponte in 2001 for drawing a veil over atrocities committed in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, by military forces who had been trained by the US. Mr Dodd claimed that the forces had been "linked to death squad activities such as killings, disappearances and other human rights abuses".
During his time in Tegucigalpa, Mr Negroponte directed funds to the US-supported Contra terrorists seeking to overthrow the government of Nicaragua. He assured them of arms and supplies from the Palmerola airstrip, the main US base in Central America. As President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is in the final stages of closing the US base in his country, Mr Negroponte is conscious of what the US could lose if a Zelaya government banned its presence at Palmerola. For their part, Hondurans have noted that when Mr Zelaya tried to return on 6 July, and his plane was refused permission to land at Tegucigalpa airport, no room was found at Palmerola.
Since last July, the US ambassador in Tegucigalpa has been the Cuban-born Hugo Llorens. He was the principal National Security adviser to Mr Bush on Venezuela at the time of the failed 2002 coup, when he was working with two other well-known State Department hardliners, Otto Reich and Elliot Abrams.
Mr Reich, a former US ambassador to Venezuela, advised Mr McCain in his presidential bid and previously worked for AT&T, the US telecoms giant. As he goes into battle against Mr Zelaya, the website of his business consultancy, Otto Reich Associates, quotes Mr Reagan: "You understand the importance of fostering democracy and economic development among our closest neighbours."
Mr Abrams was also deep in the business of supplying the Contra terrorists. He tried to sabotage the Central American peace plans proposed by Oscar Arias, then the Costa Rican President, who later received a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. In 1991 Mr Abrams, a neoconservative passionately supportive of Ehud Olmert and other leading Israeli hawks, was convicted of hiding information from the US Congress investigation of the Iran-Contra affair. The New York Times reported in 2006 that he had strong ties to then vice-president Dick Cheney.
In a divided Washington, Mrs Clinton seems in recent days to have regained some advantage. Now Washington's strategy is to minimise the role of the pan-continent Organisation of American States which, under the leadership of the independent-minded Chilean José Miguel Insulza, took a strong line against the "interim president".
Washington is now relying on Mr Arias, a firm friend in Central America, to soften the line against Mr Micheletti. He is trying to "mediate" between Mr Zelaya and the coup's appointee by putting them on the same footing. On Friday he called for a "government of national reconciliation" with ministers from both camps.
Yet the outcome of the crisis is not likely to be worked out in huddles of foreign politicians outside Honduras, but on the streets of Tegucigalpa and in the country's forests - perhaps even this weekend.
Honduran voters have traditionally - and ineffectually - been organised into two parties, the Nationals and the Liberals, whose politics are almost indistinguishable. But repudiation of Mr Micheletti is widespread. The principal roads have been blocked by Mr Zelaya's supporters brandishing banners calling for his return.
Mr Micheletti has been forced to re-establish the curfew he imposed just after the putsch. He has even offered to resign in order to prevent civil war - provided Mr Zelaya does not return. Another worrying development for Mr Micheletti came on Friday, when the armed forces delivered a solemn and urgent message that they were totally united in favour of democracy. In the world of Latin American politics, this is a sign that they are deeply divided.
At the festivities on Friday commemorating the 200th anniversary of Bolivia breaking free from Spanish rule, Mr Chavez joined Bolivia's President, Evo Morales, President Fernando Lugo of Paraguay and President Correa in a declaration of support for the re-establishment of democracy in Honduras. All four leaders are strong supporters of demands for better treatment of Latin America's indigenous peoples.
Perhaps that's what is really worrying the plotters of Tegucigalpa.
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Hugh O'Shaughnessy's study of President Fernando Lugo, 'The Priest of Paraguay', will be published next month by Zed Books
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Zelaya's Decision to Return to Honduras Raises the Stakes in the Struggle for Democracy and Sovereignty
By ALAN BENJAMIN
July 21, 2009 -- In an interview published today in La Nación, the main daily newspaper in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Manuel Zelaya, the deposed president of Honduras, announced publicly that he will "initiate [his] return to Honduras beginning Wednesday [July 22] by any of the border entry points with Guatemala, El Salvador or Nicaragua." (quoted in Agencia de Noticias EFE)
Zelaya spoke to the Argentine paper from the Honduran Embassy in Nicaragua, where he has been living since he was airlifted from his presidential home last June 28, while still in pyjamas, by U.S.-trained military troops.
Zelaya told La Nación that, "the mediator [Costa Rican President Oscar Arias] gave the putschists 72 hours to accept the mandate of the Organization of American States (OAS), meaning the reinstatement of Honduras' legitimate president. That 72-hour deadline is up tomorrow, Wednesday."
Earlier this week, Roberto Micheletti (or "Pinocheletti, as he is known in Honduras), the man installed in the presidency by the organizers of the military coup, told the press that while he agreed with many of Arias's proposals, he and his "government" could not accept reinstating Zelaya as president. "Zelaya can come back as a private citizen," Micheletti said, "and stand trial for his decision to violate the Constitution" -- a reference to Zelaya's proposed June 28 referendum on a Constituent Assembly that would rewrite the Constitution.
Zelaya stated in his interview with La Nación that "while [he] accepts the seven points of the Arias settlement, as a starting point for an agreement, those who have violated this agreement are the putschists when they rejected the main point put forward by Arias: the return of Honduras' legitimate president."
Zelaya continued: "The people of Honduras are moving to the borders so that when the 72-hour deadline is up, we can return through one of the border entry points that I mentioned. Our return will be huge. ... It is now clear that the coup plotters are not going to give up the power that they won through violence. This is not surprising, as they are the representatives of an oligarchy that has exploited our country for decades. They are the ones responsible for the civil war that is already shedding the blood of our people."
Zelaya's decision to return to Honduras raises the stakes in the struggle for democracy and sovereignty in Honduras.
Without a doubt, the Arias Plan -- imposed by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton [see background articles below] -- is a violation of the Honduran people's right to self-determination. The plan calls for Zelaya's return to office, but on the condition that he form a "government of national reconciliation" with the coup plotters and that he renounce his call for a National Constituent Assembly to rewrite Honduras' Constitution. Such a plan has been denounced loudly by union and political leaders and activists across the Americas.
The June 28 coup, in fact, was organized by the Honduran military -- with the aid of powerful military and business interests in Washington -- to prevent the proposed referendum by Zelaya on the Constituent Assembly. Zelaya argued that the Honduran constitution was designed to protect the interests of the oligarchy and the super-rich at the expense of the country's working class and peasant majority. The referendum was to consult the people on whether or not they favored convening a Constituent Assembly to rewrite the Constitution in the interests of the Honduran people.
Support for Zelaya's plan was -- and remains -- overwhelming among the people, who are tired of "free trade" agreements that impose sweatshop conditions on working people and destroy all national industry. They are tired of living in poverty, while a small minority of oligarchs own the overwhelming majority of the cultivable lands. They want a real agrarian reform and real development. They want to put an end to the mass exodus of more than 1 million Hondurans to the United States and other countries. They want to get rid of the U.S. military base stationed only 60 miles from Tegucigalpa, the capital city.
While Zelaya said he agreed with the Clinton-Arias "mediation," he also issued a statement in Managua on July 15, on the eve of the 30th anniversary of the Nicaraguan Revolution, in which he called upon the people of Honduran to "rise in insurrection -- with general strikes, mass civil disobedience, road blocks, and more -- to oust the military coup plotters and ensure the immediate return of Honduras' legitimate president."
And this sentiment to defend Honduras's democracy and sovereignty by any means necessary -- including by insurrection -- is clearly the will of the majority of the people of Honduras.
For more than three weeks now, the people of Honduras have been mobilizing in the streets -- in defiance of the military -- to demand the immediate and unconditional return of Zelaya.
Last July 16 and 17, the National Resistance Front (Frente Nacional de Resistencia) staged yet another nationwide general strike, with mass demonstrations and road-blocks in all major cities and towns.
On July 5, when Zelaya attempted to return to Honduras -- a return that was prevented by the Honduran military, who blocked the runways at the airport -- as many as 500,000 gathered at the airport to receive their returning president. In a country of only 7 million people, this is an enormous percentage of the population.
The Popular Bloc (Bloque Popular) and National Resistance Front have called for another two-day nationwide strike this coming Thursday and Friday. The movement from below has been growing with each passing day.
And the movement in support of the Honduran people is exploding across the Americas.
On July 16, at a conference that brought together trade union leaders from across the hemisphere in San Jose, Costa Rica, a decision was reached to organize mass protests in all major cities across the continent to demand that all governments break diplomatic relations with the Micheletti and that Zelaya be allowed to return without any conditions.
The president of the National Coordinating Committee of Trade Unions of Costa Rica, Jorge Coronado, announced that these protests were also being staged to protest the "gall of [Costa Rican President] Arias to 'mediate' an unacceptable deal, at the behest of the U.S. administration, that dares to put on the same footing a government democratically elected by the people and a so-called government that emanated from a military coup."
The revolutionary movement that is sweeping Honduras is showing no signs of letting up.
As Patricia Rodas, the deposed Minister of Foreign Relations of Honduras, told a rally in La Paz, Bolivia, on July 16, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Bolivia's independence, "At this very moment, the army of millions of Honduran citizens hold in their hands the destiny of all the nations and peoples of Latin America."
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Alan Benjamin is editor of The Organizer Newspaper and national organizer of Socialist Organizer.
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BACKGROUND ARTICLES FROM THE INTERNATIONAL PRESS
http://www.japantoday.com/category/world/view/zelaya-prepares-return-to-honduras-as-talks-stall
Zelaya prepares return to Honduras as talks stall
Monday 20th July, 03:04 PM JST
MANAGUA, Nicaragua -
Ousted President Manuel Zelaya held out hope for a negotiated solution to Honduras' deepening political crisis even after talks in Costa Rica fell apart, but vowed to prepare the way for his return to power regardless of their outcome.
Zelaya accused his opponents of "making a mockery" of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias' attempts to mediate an agreement and called for stronger international pressure on the government of Roberto Micheletti, the interim president sworn in by Honduras' congress after a June 28 coup.
Singling out the United States repeatedly, Zelaya said the international community risks tacitly endorsing the putsch if it does not confront the interim government that abducted and deposed him at gunpoint.
"The international community is facing a dilemma," Zelaya told reporters at the Honduran Embassy in the Nicaraguan capital late Sunday. "They asked the guerrilla movements 20 years ago to put down their arms. ... And now the conservatives come back and take up arms to boot out the leftists who are attempting a process of reform."
Arias, the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize laureate for brokering an end to Central America's civil wars, proposed a plan that would let Zelaya serve out the final months of his term, move up elections by one month to late October, grant a general amnesty and include representatives of the main political parties in a reconciliation government.
The Micheletti government endorsed several of those proposals on Sunday-but his foreign relations secretary, Carlos Lopez, rejected the overall plan, specifically citing the issue of Zelaya's return to power.
A counterproposal suggested Zelaya could return as a regular citizen-to be tried in court. Honduras' Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya before the coup, ruling that his effort to hold a referendum on calling for a constitutional assembly was illegal.
Many Hondurans viewed the referendum as an attempt by Zelaya to push for a socialist-leaning government similar to the one his ally Hugo Chavez has established in Venezuela.
Zelaya, a wealthy rancher who shifted left during his presidency, charged that the current constitution protects a system of government that excludes the poor.
The aftermath of the coup is turning into a major test of Latin American democracy and of the Obama administration's policy toward the region.
The U.S., the United Nations and the Organization of American States have demanded that Zelaya be reinstated, and no foreign government has recognized Micheletti.
In Washington, OAS chief Jose Miguel Insulza said Sunday that the international community continues to support Zelaya's return to power, and the Micheletti government needs to confront that reality.
"This is a coup that failed," Insulza told a news conference.
But further isolating impoverished Honduras, even Zelaya's allies concede, puts the country's stability at further risk.
Arias promised further efforts to seek a solution, and Vilma Morales, a negotiator for the interim government, said talks could resume Wednesday.
"Dialogue is not broken," she told the AP.
Zelaya, who previously vowed to go back to Honduras and set up a parallel government if the talks failed, left open the possibility that talks could bear fruit. But he said he would push forward with organizing "resistance" inside Honduras to prepare for his eventual return. He did not give details.
The Honduran military thwarted Zelaya's first attempt to fly home on July 5 by blocking the runway at the airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa.
"Next weekend we will have everything necessary to make our return," he said late Sunday in Managua. "The social pact in Honduras is broken; the military broke it."
___
Associated Press writers Marienela Jimenez and Diego Mendez in San Jose, Costa Rica, and Mark Stevenson in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, contributed to this report.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/latinamerica/articles/2009/07/20/tensions_rise_as_honduran_crisis_talks_fail/
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Pressure grows on Honduras, violence feared
By Simon Gardner and Esteban Israel | July 20, 2009
TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) - Honduras' de facto leader came under increased pressure on Monday to hand power back to the ousted president with Washington threatening to cut aid and Latin American leaders warning of bloodshed if he does not back down.
Efforts to broker an end to the power struggle in Honduras following a June 28 military coup collapsed on Sunday after interim leader Roberto Micheletti rejected a proposal to reinstate overthrown President Manuel Zelaya.
Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, the frustrated peacemaker in the talks, asked both sides to give him until Wednesday to broker a solution to the crisis. But Micheletti, who was appointed by Honduras' Congress after the coup, remained defiant despite being shunned by foreign governments.
"My position is unchangeable," he said in a speech on Monday at the presidential palace to a standing ovation.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held a "very tough phone call" with the caretaker president, warning him he could face cuts in economic aid unless he strikes a deal with his enemy, spokesman P.J. Crowley said.
"She reminded him about the consequences for Honduras if they fail to accept the principles that President Arias has laid out, which would (have) a significant impact in terms of aid and consequences, potentially longer-term consequences ..., for the relationship between Honduras and the United States," he said.
It was not clear what sanctions might apply but the options include slashing $180 million in economic aid.
The United States has already halted $16.5 million in military aid and multilateral lenders have put another $200 million on hold.
The European Commission also tightened the screws on Micheletti, suspending all budgetary support payments to Honduras. It had earmarked 65.5 million euros ($92.73 million) in payments in the 2007-10 period.
Latin American leaders fear violence in the impoverished Central American country unless Micheletti steps aside.
"Insurrection and confrontation are not a good path to take, but I don't think we will avoid it unless the de facto government shows some flexibility," said Jose Miguel Insulza, the chief of the Organization of American States.
The United States and other governments pleaded with Zelaya to wait out the 72 hours requested by Arias before staging a return to Honduras from exile in Nicaragua.
Zelaya says resistance is being organized in Honduras to pave the way for his return this weekend, despite the de facto government's threats to arrest him. The government has imposed a night-time curfew.
Zelaya tried to fly back to Honduras earlier this month but soldiers blocked the runway and at least one protester was killed in clashes with the army.
Pro-Zelaya protesters gathered peacefully outside Congress on Monday but protest leader Juan Barahona said they planned highway blockades on Wednesday and union leaders called for a national strike on Thursday and Friday.
"This is just the start. For now, these are peaceful protests but things could get a lot worse," said Wilfredo Moncado, a 59-year-old union leader who joined the march.
A DIFFERENT COUP
Zelaya was expelled from the textile and coffee exporting country in his pajamas in the middle of the night. He had upset his political rivals by trying to lift presidential term limits and the army toppled him after the Supreme ordered his arrest.
The crisis is widely seen as a litmus test for U.S. President Barack Obama as he seeks a fresh start with Latin America despite ideological differences with vocal U.S. foes like Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a close ally of the deposed Honduran leader.
Micheletti has a base of local support in business circles as well as the Supreme Court, Congress and the Catholic Church, making this coup unlike those that battered Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s.
On Monday, he urged business leaders to continue investing in Honduras and asked his supporters to help him try to turn the tide of world opinion in his favor.
Analysts say he is biding his time so that Zelaya's reinstatement becomes a moot point. His term was due to end in January, and elections were scheduled for November.
(Additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa, Juan Casas and John McPhaul in San Jose, Tim Gaynor in Washington and Rodrigo Martinez in Santiago; Writing by Louise Egan; Editing by Kieran Murray)
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http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS-World-Rest-of-World-Honduras-talks-break-down-over-Zelayas-return/articleshow/4797187.cms
Honduras talks break down over Zelaya's return
AP 20 July 2009, 08:58am IST
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica: Talks on resolving Honduras' leadership crisis broke off Sunday after the interim government rejected a proposed compromise, saying a provision calling for ousted President Manuel Zelaya to serve out his term was "unacceptable."
Zelaya accused his opponents of "making a mockery" of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias' attempts to mediate a solution and called for stronger international pressure on the government of Roberto Micheletti, the interim president sworn in by congress after the June 28 coup.
"They have made a mockery of even (US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham) Clinton," Zelaya said. It was Clinton who invited Arias to mediate.
The two sides remained deadlocked on the issue of Zelaya's return after a fourth day of negotiations, but Arias promised renewed efforts to seek a deal and avoid bloodshed in the Central American country.
"It was not possible to reach a satisfactory agreement. The Zelaya delegation fully accepted my proposal, but not that of Mr Roberto Micheletti," Arias said.
He added that he will spend the next three days "working much harder to see if we can reach an agreement, because what is the alternative to dialogue?"
On Saturday, Arias proposed a plan that would let Zelaya serve out the final months of his term, move up elections by one month to late October, grant a general amnesty and include representatives of the main political parties in a reconciliation government.
Arias, the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize laureate for brokering an end to Central America's civil wars, had urged patience from Zelaya and flexibility from the interim government, which has ruled since the military whisked Zelaya out of the country at gunpoint.
The Micheletti government endorsed several of his proposals on Sunday, but his foreign relations secretary, Carlos Lopez, rejected the overall plan, specifically citing the issue of Zelaya's return.
"Dear mediator ... I'm very sorry, but your proposals are unacceptable," Lopez said at a news conference after the talks. Arias' compromise, he added, "interferes with Honduran internal affairs."
The government that deposed Zelaya offered instead to create a truth commission to "let the Honduran people and the international community see all the acts that led to the current situation," according to a letter signed by Lopez. It refused to budge on its insistence that Zelaya would be arrested and prosecuted if he returns, guaranteeing only that he would be given "due process."
Lopez told CNN en Espanol that his delegation would return to the Costa Rican capital on Wednesday "to continue our conversations."
But Enrique Flores, a negotiator for Zelaya, said that while Arias may continue "personal efforts" to reach an agreement, formal talks are over.
"Today, the dialogue ended," Flores said. Zelaya, who previously vowed to go back to Honduras and set up a parallel government if the talks failed, left open the possibility that talks could bear fruit. But he said he would push forward with organizing "resistance" inside Honduras to prepare for his eventual return, though he did not give details.
"Next weekend we will have everything necessary to make our return," he told reporters late Sunday in the Nicaraguan capital, Managua. "The social pact in Honduras is broken; the military broke it."
The Honduran military thwarted Zelaya's first attempt to fly home on July 5 by blocking the runway at the airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa.
The coup is a major test of Latin American democracy and of the Obama administration's policy toward the region. The US, the United Nations and the Organization of American States have demanded that Zelaya be reinstated, and no foreign government has recognized Micheletti.
In Washington, OAS chief Jose Miguel Insulza said Sunday that the international community continues to support Zelaya's return to power, and the Micheletti government needs to confront that reality.
"This is a coup that failed," Insulza told a news conference. Honduran labor groups supporting the ousted president called for a general strike Thursday and Friday.
And in Nicaragua, Zelaya's foreign minister Patricia Rodas called for a massive march if mediation fails. She attended the 30th anniversary celebrations of the Sandinista revolution there on Sunday.
Honduras' Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya before the coup, ruling that his effort to hold a referendum on calling for a constitutional assembly was illegal.
Many Hondurans viewed the referendum as an attempt by Zelaya to push for a socialist-leaning government similar to the one his ally Hugo Chavez has established in Venezuela.
Zelaya, a wealthy rancher who shifted to left during his presidency, charged that the current constitution protects a system of government that excludes the poor. But he never specified what changes he wanted to make.
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Obama's Bullish Behavoir in Latin America
Honduras and the Big Stick
By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF
Liberals who have idealized Obama don't want to believe that their President is capable of bullish behavior towards Latin America. It was Bush, they say, who epitomized arrogant U.S.-style imperialism and not the new resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Recent events in Central America however force us to look at the Obama administration in a sobering new light. While it's unclear whether Obama had advance warning of an imminent military coup d'etat in Honduras the White House has not emerged from the Zelaya affair unsullied.
In December, 2008, even before his inauguration, Obama received an irate letter from Honduran president Manuel Zelaya demanding an end to arrogant and interventionist U.S. ambassadors in Tegucigalpa. Just eight months earlier American ambassador Hugo Llorens had taken on the government by making inflammatory remarks. During a press conference the diplomat declared that Zelaya's move to rewrite the constitution was "a Honduran matter and it's a delicate matter to comment on as a foreign diplomat." But then, contradicting himself and inserting himself into the volatile political milieu, Llorens remarked that "one can't violate the constitution to create a constitution, because if you don't have a constitution the law of the jungle reigns."
If Obama was serious about restoring U.S. moral credibility world-wide he might have cleaned house by removing Bush appointees such as Llorens. An émigré from Castro's Cuba, Llorens worked as an Assistant Treasurer at Chase Manhattan Bank before entering the Foreign Service. As DeputyDirector of the Office of Economic Policy and Summit Coordination in the State Department during Clinton-time, he played an important role in spearheading the corporately-friendly Free Trade Area of the Americas or FTAA. But it was chiefly during the Bush years that Llorens distinguished himself, serving as the Director of Andean Affairs at the National Security Council. At the NSC, Llorens was the most important advisor to Bush and Condoleezza Rice on matters pertaining to Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Peru, and Ecuador.
While Zelaya's move to rewrite the Honduran constitution antagonized Llorens it also inflamed the local business elite and no doubt the U.S. foreign policy establishment. Perhaps these groups feared a Honduran repeat of the South American "Pink Tide": across the region leftist leaders from Hugo Chávez to Rafael Correa have mobilized civil society in an effort to rewrite their respective nations' constitutions.
Chávez's 1999 constitution provides for some of the most comprehensive human rights provisions of any constitution in the world while also including special protection for women, indigenous peoples and the environment. The constitution moreover allows for broad citizen participation in national life. The preamble states that one of the Constitution's goals is to establish a participatory democracy achieved through elected representatives, popular votes by referendum and, perhaps most importantly, popular mobilization. In Venezuela, it was Chávez's constitution which helped to solidify his alliance with traditionally marginalized sectors of the population.
In Ecuador, traditional political parties and wealthy elites labeled Correa "dictatorial" after the president called for the drafting of a new constitution. In the end however a large plurality of voters approved the new 2008 constitution which provides for free universal health care, a universal right to water and prohibition of its privatization and the redistribution of large unused landholdings. Even more dramatically, the constitution declares that Ecuador is a "pacifist state" and outlaws foreign military bases on Ecuadoran soil.
As I explain in my recent book Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left (Palgrave, 2008), there's been a potent alliance as of late between leftist Latin leaders on the one hand and dynamic social movements on the other. In Ecuador, the main indigenous federation supported the new constitution as did organized labor. Indeed, Correa's move to draft a new constitution could help to establish tighter links between the president and progressive social forces as per Chávez's Venezuela.
In the media, the Honduran imbroglio has been depicted as a struggle over presidential power and term limits. But while any new constitution might have extended presidential term limits, such a reform could have also led to new progressive amendments to the law and further radicalization on the ground. In recent years Honduras has seen the emergence of a vibrant social and political scene including labor, Garifuna (Afro-Honduran people) and Indians. If Zelaya had been successful at pushing through his constitutional reform he would have been able to mobilize such groups.
What is the connection between U.S. interests and constitutional reform? If you had any doubt about Washington's true intentions in Honduras consider the following AP Report for July 8 about diplomatic negotiations between the coup regime and ousted president Zelaya: "Clinton would not discuss specifics of the mediation process, which she said would begin soon, but a senior U.S. official said one option being considered would be to forge a compromise under which Zelaya would be allowed to return and serve out his remaining six months in office with limited powers [italics added]. Zelaya, in return, would pledge to drop his aspirations for a constitutional change."
It's the State Department then under Hillary Clinton, allied in spirit to figures from the old Bush establishment, which is seeking to cut off constitutional reform in Honduras --- reform which could lead to popular mobilization as we've seen in Ecuador and Venezuela. Obama meanwhile has condemned the coup but his failure to rein in either Llorens or Clinton suggests that he too believes that Zelaya's proposal for a constitutional reform is dangerous and needs to be halted.
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Nikolas Kozloff is the author of Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2008) Follow his blog at senorchichero.blogspot.com
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http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewFreeUse.act?fuid=NDE4ODExNg%3D%3D
July 19, 2009
Democracy hangs by a thread in Honduras
The right-wing coup d'état is faltering, but its supporters have powerful friends in Washington. Hugh O'Shaughnessy reports
The international group of right-wingers who staged the coup d'état against the democratic government of Honduras on 28 June are watching their plot fast unravel. There is stiffening international opposition to their protégé, Roberto Micheletti, who, in his capacity as President of Congress, ordered President Manuel Zelaya to be expelled from the country by plane in his pyjamas.
Mr Zelaya gave negotiators meeting in Costa Rica until midnight yesterday to restore him to office, threatening to secretly return to Honduras and attempt to retake power on his own if no agreement is reached. He indicated he would reject any power-sharing deal, and, at a news conference at the Honduran embassy in Nicaragua, said: "I am going back to Honduras, but I am not going to give you the date, hour or place, or say if I'm going to enter through land, air or sea."
As the Acting President's support shrinks at home, the plotters are lobbying to have Mr Micheletti shored up from abroad by means of a declaration of legitimacy from the US Congress. That scheme is not prospering. Enrique Ortez Colindres, the supremely undiplomatic octogenarian appointed foreign minister by Mr Micheletti, has had to resign, but not before he called Barack Obama "a negrito who knows nothing about anything", on Honduran television.
For some of the plotters it is their second attempt to overthrow an elected reformist government in Latin America: the group includes prominent figures involved in the 2002 ousting of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who was kidnapped for 48 hours and sent to a Caribbean island before being restored to office after widespread popular protest.
The temporary toppling of Mr Chavez was welcomed by the Bush administration, the Blair government and the International Monetary Fund. This weekend, the US seems destined for a replay of 2002's Operation Chaotic Coup. Amid a stream of contradictory messages it is clear that last month's putsch against Mr Zelaya was brewed up in Washington by a group of extreme conservatives from Venezuela, Honduras and the US. They appear to have hidden their plans from the White House, but hoped eventually to bounce President Obama into backing them and supporting the "interim president". They are making much of Mr Zelaya's alliance with Mr Chavez, whose sense of nationalism challenges US hegemony.
Financial backing for the coup is identified by some as coming from the pharmaceutical industry, which fears Mr Zelaya's plans to produce generic drugs and distribute them cheaply to the impoverished majority in Honduras who lack all but the most primitive health facilities. Others point to big companies in the telecommunications industry opposed to Hondutel, Honduras's state-owned provider. Parallels are being made with ITT, the US telecommunications company that offered the Nixon government funds for the successful overthrow of President Salvador Allende of Chile in 1973.
A key figure is Robert Carmona-Borjas, a Venezuelan active against Mr Chavez in 2002, who later fled to the US. He runs the Washington-based Arcadia, which calls itself "an innovative 'next generation' anti-corruption organisation". Its website carries three video clips alleging, without evidence, that Mr Zelaya, his associates and Hondutel are deeply corrupt. Behind Arcadia are the US-funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED)and the International Republican Institute (IRI), the well-funded overseas arm of the Republican Party. Currently active among the Uighurs of western China, the NED has this year funnelled $1.2m (Ł740,000) for "political activity" in Honduras.
The focus of attention in the campaign against Mr Zelaya is now on the office of Senator John McCain, the defeated US presidential candidate, who is chairman of the IRI, takes an interest in telecoms affairs in the US Congress and has benefited handsomely from campaign contributions from US telecoms companies - which are said to have funded the abortive 2002 coup against Mr Chavez.
Mr McCain's former legislative counsel, John Timmons, arranged the visit of Micheletti supporters to Washington on 7 July where they met journalists at the National Press Club "to clarify any misunderstandings about Honduras's constitutional process and ... the preservation of the country's democratic institutions".
Meanwhile, within the US administration, difficulties in co-ordination have emerged between the State Department and the White House, with the Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, issuing a low-key condemnation of the coup which was quickly superseded by stronger words from Mr Obama. The President called for Mr Zelaya's reinstatement, which Mrs Clinton had failed to demand.
The conservative-minded Mrs Clinton retains John Negroponte, an ambassador to Honduras under Ronald Reagan, as an adviser. He also represented George W Bush at the UN and in Baghdad. Democratic Senator Chris Dodd attacked Mr Negroponte in 2001 for drawing a veil over atrocities committed in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, by military forces who had been trained by the US. Mr Dodd claimed that the forces had been "linked to death squad activities such as killings, disappearances and other human rights abuses".
During his time in Tegucigalpa, Mr Negroponte directed funds to the US-supported Contra terrorists seeking to overthrow the government of Nicaragua. He assured them of arms and supplies from the Palmerola airstrip, the main US base in Central America. As President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is in the final stages of closing the US base in his country, Mr Negroponte is conscious of what the US could lose if a Zelaya government banned its presence at Palmerola. For their part, Hondurans have noted that when Mr Zelaya tried to return on 6 July, and his plane was refused permission to land at Tegucigalpa airport, no room was found at Palmerola.
Since last July, the US ambassador in Tegucigalpa has been the Cuban-born Hugo Llorens. He was the principal National Security adviser to Mr Bush on Venezuela at the time of the failed 2002 coup, when he was working with two other well-known State Department hardliners, Otto Reich and Elliot Abrams.
Mr Reich, a former US ambassador to Venezuela, advised Mr McCain in his presidential bid and previously worked for AT&T, the US telecoms giant. As he goes into battle against Mr Zelaya, the website of his business consultancy, Otto Reich Associates, quotes Mr Reagan: "You understand the importance of fostering democracy and economic development among our closest neighbours."
Mr Abrams was also deep in the business of supplying the Contra terrorists. He tried to sabotage the Central American peace plans proposed by Oscar Arias, then the Costa Rican President, who later received a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. In 1991 Mr Abrams, a neoconservative passionately supportive of Ehud Olmert and other leading Israeli hawks, was convicted of hiding information from the US Congress investigation of the Iran-Contra affair. The New York Times reported in 2006 that he had strong ties to then vice-president Dick Cheney.
In a divided Washington, Mrs Clinton seems in recent days to have regained some advantage. Now Washington's strategy is to minimise the role of the pan-continent Organisation of American States which, under the leadership of the independent-minded Chilean José Miguel Insulza, took a strong line against the "interim president".
Washington is now relying on Mr Arias, a firm friend in Central America, to soften the line against Mr Micheletti. He is trying to "mediate" between Mr Zelaya and the coup's appointee by putting them on the same footing. On Friday he called for a "government of national reconciliation" with ministers from both camps.
Yet the outcome of the crisis is not likely to be worked out in huddles of foreign politicians outside Honduras, but on the streets of Tegucigalpa and in the country's forests - perhaps even this weekend.
Honduran voters have traditionally - and ineffectually - been organised into two parties, the Nationals and the Liberals, whose politics are almost indistinguishable. But repudiation of Mr Micheletti is widespread. The principal roads have been blocked by Mr Zelaya's supporters brandishing banners calling for his return.
Mr Micheletti has been forced to re-establish the curfew he imposed just after the putsch. He has even offered to resign in order to prevent civil war - provided Mr Zelaya does not return. Another worrying development for Mr Micheletti came on Friday, when the armed forces delivered a solemn and urgent message that they were totally united in favour of democracy. In the world of Latin American politics, this is a sign that they are deeply divided.
At the festivities on Friday commemorating the 200th anniversary of Bolivia breaking free from Spanish rule, Mr Chavez joined Bolivia's President, Evo Morales, President Fernando Lugo of Paraguay and President Correa in a declaration of support for the re-establishment of democracy in Honduras. All four leaders are strong supporters of demands for better treatment of Latin America's indigenous peoples.
Perhaps that's what is really worrying the plotters of Tegucigalpa.
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Hugh O'Shaughnessy's study of President Fernando Lugo, 'The Priest of Paraguay', will be published next month by Zed Books
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