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Deposed Zelaya holed up in embassy
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-09-23 03:13 TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras: Deposed President Manuel Zelaya's surprise return to Honduras to reclaim his seat had him holed up in the Brazilian Embassy Tuesday, saying he feared for his life as heavily armed soldiers marched outside and helicopters buzzed overhead.
Water, electricity and phone lines had been cut, and neighboring buildings taken over by the military. "We know we are in danger," Zelaya said during interviews with various media outlets. "We are ready to risk everything, to sacrifice." Zelaya, forced out of his country at gunpoint, triumphantly popped up in the capital on Monday, telling captivated supporters that after three months of international exile and a secretive 15-hour cross country journey, he was ready to lead again. Interim President Roberto Micheletti's response was terse: initially he said Zelaya was lying about being there, and then - after Zelaya appeared on national television - Micheletti pressed Brazil to hand Zelaya over so he could be arrested under a warrant issued by the Supreme Court charging treason and abuse of authority.
"The inviolability of a diplomatic mission does not imply the protection of delinquents or fugitives from justice," said Micheletti's foreign ministry adviser, Mario Fortinthe. Micheletti repeated his insistence that had never been a coup - just a "constitutional succession" ordered by the courts and approved by Congress. "Coups do not allow freedom of assembly," he wrote in a column published Tuesday in the Washington Post. "They do not guarantee freedom of the press, much less a respect for human rights. In Honduras, these freedoms remain intact and vibrant." Meanwhile Micheletti closed airports and borders, and baton-wielding police fired tear gas to chase thousands of demonstrators away from the embassy where Zelaya's supporters had gathered. Some gas canisters fell inside the walls of the Brazilian embassy, where Zelaya, his wife, some of their children, Cabinet members, journalists, about 70 people in all, kept a tense watch on police and soldiers who patrolled from neighboring rooftops. Some napped on couches, others curled up on the floor beneath travel posters of Brazilian beaches. Zelaya said he had no plans to leave and he repeatedly asked to speak with Micheletti. Those negotiations have yet to begin, and with his embassy the current hotspot for the Honduran crisis, Brazil's president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called Zelaya and pressed him not to do anything that might provoke an invasion of the diplomatic mission. Embassy staff were told to stay home, and embassy charge d'affaires Francisco Catunda Resende said water, phone and electricity services had been cut, leaving the mission with a diesel powered generator, according to a spokesman with Brazil's Foreign Ministry who did not give his name in keeping with policy. |
