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Honduran leader, Zelaya inch toward crisis talks
(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-10-04 16:12
TEGUCIGALPA: Honduran de facto leader Roberto Micheletti and ousted President Manuel Zelaya on Saturday edged toward negotiating an end to a political crisis triggered after troops toppled the leftist in a June coup. Micheletti met recently with Organization of American States chief Jose Miguel Insulza in a step toward talks, and Zelaya supporters signaled they were open to dialogue brokered by an OAS mission visiting Honduras.
In a theatrical twist, Zelaya, a logging magnate who often wears a trademark cowboy hat, on Saturday dedicated a poem by 19th-century Guatemalan poet Ismael Cerna to Micheletti from inside his embassy refuge. "I care not if I do not see the light of day, if in my conscious I have that of the heavens," said Zelaya, reading from Cerna, who was jailed as a political prisoner. Zelaya's supporters spent Saturday singing and playing guitars and drums fashioned from scraps of wood, washing lines and plastic buckets in the embassy grounds, said a Reuters photographer inside the compound. 'Nothing Concrete So Far' Troops exiled Zelaya at gunpoint in June after he riled powerful conservatives by fueling fears he wanted to lift presidential term limits to stay in power. Both Honduran leaders say they are ready for talks even though there seems to be no middle ground. Micheletti says Zelaya must face treason charges and is resisting pressure to restore him. Zelaya insists he be reinstated unconditionally to office. "In the rhetoric there is a willingness to talk and find solutions but there is nothing concrete so far," said Efrain Diaz, a Honduran political analyst. "The subject of Zelaya's restoration can stall any negotiations and they should look at alternatives, such as both sides naming someone who can manage the transition," he said. |
