It seems that as of now no one will be going from the OAS to try to persuade the Micheletti government that the Arias accords should be agreed to. The coup government has forced Zelaya and the OAS to compromise and in effect arrange for a face saving return of Zelaya as a lame duck president with reduced powers. But this was not enough for the coup government which continues to hold that everything it did was on the up and up and just defending the constitution even though I doubt that the constitution says it is OK to take the ruling president and fly them to another country against their will. There are processes for impeaching Zelaya under Honduran law and indeed those processes were partly followed before the decision to short circuit them and spirit him off into exile.
This move by the coup government is just a slap in the face to the U.S and OAS who went to a lot of trouble to accommodate the coup by getting Arias to arrange for a solution that would give amnesty to all involved in the coup. It will be interesting to see what Obama does now. Will he huff and puff or actually take decisive action. I doubt that it will be the latter.
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Honduran regime rejects delegation seeking crisis solution
TEGUCIGALPA (AFP) – The Honduran regime on Sunday said it would turn back a high-level delegation from the Organization of American States that is seeking a negotiated solution to the political crisis triggered by a coup.
The delegation, including the foreign ministers of Argentina, Mexico, Canada, Costa Rica, Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, was set to arrive in Tegucigalpa on Tuesday.
The Honduran foreign ministry said it would not receive the group because it included OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza, who it claimed was biased.
It also said that other unnamed countries it considered more sympathetic were not represented in the delegation.
The Tuesday visit was to coincide with the arrival of thousands of pro-Zelaya activists from around the country that are to converge on Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, the two largest cities in Honduras.
The announcement is also at odds with an earlier statement by acting foreign minister Carlos Lopez. "We expect that with the arrival of the foreign ministers (in the OAS delegation) relations will be normalized" with the international community, he told AFP on Saturday.
The Honduran statement Sunday said that the visit could be rescheduled, as long as the delegation did not include Insulza.
"Unfortunately Insulza's intransigence and his insistence on including himself in the delegation and to exclude foreign ministers of member states that ... are open to reconsidering our case has made it impossible to allow this visit in the scheduled date," read the foreign ministry statement.
It complained of Insulza's alleged "lack of objectivity, impartiality and professionalism" in his job, "which has resulted in serious damage to democracy" in Honduras.
OAS officials announced they were sending the delegation -- aimed at supporting the "re-establishment of democratic order" -- on Friday.
Honduras's membership in the OAS was suspended following a June 28 coup in which soldiers ousted President Manuel Zelaya from power and put him on a plane to neighboring Nicaragua.
The suspension came after Insulza, a former Chilean foreign minister, issued a report critical of the interim regime.
Zelaya has expressed support for a proposal that would allow him to return to power, offer political amnesty to those involved in the coup, and schedule early presidential elections, which was proposed by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias.
Honduran interim leader Roberto Micheletti has rejected the Arias plan because it includes Zelaya's return to power.
Washington has so far refused to recognize Micheletti's government, has suspended military aid to Honduras and revoked the diplomatic visas of some of the interim Honduran leaders.
The political crisis in Honduras will be one of the issues to be discussed as the leaders of the United States, Mexico and Canada meet in Guadalajara Sunday and Monday.
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