Honduras rivals to discuss Zelaya return post-coup

[L. Coyote]

Source: Reuters

Tue Oct 13, 2009 2:20pm EDT

TEGUCIGALPA, Oct 13 (Reuters) - The rivals in Honduras' political crisis opened new talks on Tuesday to discuss the proposed return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya, a thorny issue that could derail the fragile negotiations altogether.

.........

"We are not optimistic about the result of the dialogue," Rasel Tome, a former Zelaya government official who is with him in the embassy, told Reuters on Monday. One of Zelaya's negotiators abandoned the talks on Tuesday and was replaced by another aide of the ousted president.

........

Juan Ramon Martinez, a Honduran political analyst, says Micheletti is playing for time and has no intention of giving in. "The negotiation is not to reach agreements, it's just to calm international opinion."

Zelaya's supporters plan a series of protests this week. They are threatening to disrupt the election campaign and block voting centers if their leader is not reinstated in the next few days.


....

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSN136906920091013

---

Previous LATEST compilation:

struggle4progress Sat Oct-10-09
Honduras de facto leader further restricts media
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4098508

REC this:
GD: Honduran abuses rampant after coup - rights groups
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6765551

I'm on the road. Please keep this compilation current as news breaks. Thanks ....

[L. Coyote]

1. Honduras Coup Leaders Mock Dialogue

Honduras Coup Leaders Mock Dialogue
October 13, 2009 - http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=14967


HAVANA TIMES, Oct. 13 - The de facto government in Honduras is imposing its own agenda, ratcheting up repression and seeking to delay any resolution of the crisis. The rel-UITA website brings us the following report on Monday with photos by Giorgio Trucchi.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras - Despite national and international reports of satisfactory progress in talks between the delegations of Roberto Micheletti and President Manuel Zelaya, it is perceived by many in the resistance movement that the de facto government has no intention of searching for a resolution to the over three-month Honduran stalemate.

At this time it is difficult to understand the game that the de facto government is playing. On one hand they could be using the talks merely to stage a grand media extravaganza to legitimize the upcoming November 29 elections-again risking confrontation with the international community, but which now seems divided.

On the other hand these may be a way to find the excuse needed for Roberto Micheletti to remain in power longer, putting President Manuel Zelaya in a corner and bogging down the resistance through pressure and repression, which has increased considerably over these last few days and has made a mockery of the recent OAS recommendations.

According to the OAS secretary-general’s Honduras adviser, John Biehl, “Any elections taking place without President Manuel Zelaya would probably have to be highly militarized, with a high degree of violence, which would mean that the subsequent government would be ignored by the great majority of countries and the isolation of Honduras would continue.”

..............

[L. Coyote]

2. Unknown assailants fire on Catholic seminary in Tegucigalpa

Unknown assailants fire on Catholic seminary in Tegucigalpa
Catholic News Agency - ‎55 minutes ago‎ - http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=17376


Tegucigalpa, Oct 13, 2009 / 02:26 pm (CNA).- Unknown assailants fired 14 shots at the Seminary of Our Lady of Suyapa in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, on Sunday. Fortunately, there were no one was reported as injured in the drive-by shooting.

According to the local police spokesman, Orlin Cerrato, the police do not have any suspects and have only discovered that the shots were fired from a passing vehicle. ....

The Seminary of Our Lady of Suyapa was the site where Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga met with the secretary general of the Organization of American States, Jose Miguel Insulza, about the situation regarding deposed President Manuel Zelaya.

During his visit July 3 visit to Honduras, Insulza called for Zelaya to be reinstated.

[L. Coyote]

3. Venezuelan Ambassador Discusses Relations Between US and Region

Venezuelan Ambassador Discusses Relations Between US and Region
http://www.international.ucla.edu/news/article.asp?parentid=112486

Bernardo Alvarez Herrera, the ambassador from Venezuela, says that the political crisis in Honduras and the U.S. military presence in Colombia will be pivotal issues in U.S. relations in Latin America.

By Kevin Matthews
Senior Writer - UCLA Today

"You cannot be talking about peace and at the same time increasing the presence of the military in Colombia."

Mixed signals from Washington have left Bernardo Álvarez Herrera, the ambassador from Venezuela, uncertain about where relations between Latin America and the United States are heading under the Obama administration.

But he thinks he'll know how to tell. After a long period of paying little attention to Latin America, U.S. policymakers have turned to the region again because of a June military coup in Honduras and controversy over U.S. access to military bases in Columbia.

"The two issues of the Honduras crisis and the bases — military bases in Colombia — are going to be turning points in the relationship," Álvarez Herrera told listeners in Bunche Hall on Thursday, Oct. 8. The lecture by the Venezuelan diplomat and political scientist was sponsored by the Latin American Institute and the International Institute.

On both issues, Álvarez Herrera said, some in the United States government are taking positions more in line with cold war strategy than with what he spoke of as the new reality in Latin America. The Obama administration pressed for the reinstatement of ousted President Manuel Zelaya following the coup in Honduras, but Venezuelan and other allies of Zelaya in the region have been alarmed by equivocal messages from the State Department and by congressional lobbying on behalf of the de facto military government in Honduras.

...........

=======================
Car repaired, back on the road for me .....

[Peace Patriot]

4. How to rig an election: First, you stage a coup....

--to rid the government and especially the election machinery of any good public servants, and to terrorize the population

--you shoot up the president's house, kidnap him at gunpoint, fly him to a US air base for refueling and then drop him on the tarmac in his pajamas in foreign country to further ridicule and belittle the notion of decent government

--then you make all kinds of wild charges against him, in his absence, suspend habeas corpus for everyone else and start beating up, arresting and deporting international media

--then you really clamp down, using live ammunition on peaceful protestors, killing several, sending hit squads to assassinate selected leftist leaders to "send a message", shoot out tires of protest buses, arrest thousands of protestors (after tear-gassing and beating on them), torture and rape prisoners, and get your US backers to proclaim to Congress and to the corpo/fascist press that you are doing all this as "patriots" in defense of the Honduran Constitution (written by Reaganites in the 1980s)

--THEN--when all of Latin America and the entire world condemns what you are doing, you start pretending that you are willing to negotiate, so that your backers can portray you as "reasonable" and you... ahem... agree to hold the scheduled election; but first...

--you beat up, torture and kill more leftist activists, and brutally repress more protests, and make up laws giving you the power to arrest anyone, any time, anywhere, for anything at all, and take further measures to shut down the uppity media (which dared to set up stealth broadcasting sites)--you invade their studios, pour acid on or confiscate their broadcasting equipment, and proclaim the right to keep them off the air for "national security" purposes--and you begin home invasions (hunting people down, dragging people out of their homes) and other such activities, like breaking the bones of one of the political candidates, to show that nothing and no one is sacred...

--you have one of your military generals say that the Honduran military "will not permit" a boycott of the 'election' that you are going to stage--'Voters, beware! Don't you dare not to vote!"

--when the ousted president manages to get back into the country, and takes refuge in the Brazilian embassy, as the guest of Brazil, you surround the embassy with soldiers, guns and military vehicles, to prevent the president's supporters from holding rallies, and bombard the embassy with tear gas and other poisons, and ear-splitting sound weapons, then, when the OAS and the UN and Brazil object, you start pretending that you might talk to the actual president of the country, but not to restore him to his office, rather to arrest him and try him for "treason" (--what was his "treason"? um, being the president!), or, on the other hand, you announce that he can rot in the embassy forever, it's immaterial to you

--you forbid the head of the OAS to set foot in Honduras, nor any OAS ambassadors, then, when even the US starts getting on your case, you let the OAS in, for "talks"

--talk, talk, talk, talk...

--June, July, August gone by, September, half of October...going, going...

--THEN you hold the 'election'!!!!

No need for Diebold/ES&S 'trade secret' voting machines. No need for any Karl Roves or Supreme Courts. No need to supress any poor peoples' voter registration groups (like ACORN). You WANT people to vote! Come one, come all! Vote for one of these two shill candidates! Show the world that Honduras is oh so democratic and open and free! And they'll probably even provide transportation for those whom they've crippled, and provide votes-from-the-grave for those whom they've killed. And if anybody--oh, say--puts a big "X" on their ballot or votes for two candidates--to invalidate their ballot as a protest, well--nobody's gonna see any of these ballots anyway, don't ya know? And, heck, considering all the terror and fear in the land, they might even win, legit-like, among the 50 people whose votes are counted!

They've got one on the Bushwhacks. First, stage a coup...

[L. Coyote]

5. Indeed!