Official talks between representatives of ousted President Mel Zelaya and the de facto government of Roberto Michelleti are set to resume today in Tegucigalpa after a weekend recess. As reported yesterday, the two sides made progress on a number of substantive issues late last week, including around the issue of amnesty [there will currently be done] and the formation of a unity government. Now, however, discussions will turn to the biggest issue dividing the two sides: the reinstatement of Mel Zelaya as president. Micheletti [profiled by Reuters this morning here] has been unwilling to budge on this point over the last three plus months, and as AFP reported yesterday, Zelaya warned observers that Tuesday could be yet another “let down” for those eagerly awaiting a resolution to the Honduran crisis. “It’s going to be an essential day of dialogue to find out if this will all be resolved, but I don’t have much confidence,” Zelaya told the news agency yesterday. “I believe the coup regime will continue to deny the resolutions of the OAS and the international community.” Such remarks on the part of Mr. Zelaya—including placing a deadline of Oct. 15 on the current round of talks—have been criticized by some political analysts and backers of the de facto regime speaking with pro-Micheletti papers in Honduras. “The deadline given by the Zelayistas totally distorts the process of dialogue that should be flexible, coherent and done in good faith. Setting an ultimatum generates uncertainty,” lawyer and analyst Raul Pineda Alvardo recently told El Heraldo, for example.
Meanwhile, while many Zelaya supporters say there will be a new call for protests if Mel Zelaya is not restored to power by the end of the week, so too are certain sectors of the business community threatening to strike if Mr. Zelaya is reinstated. In Southern Honduras, the president of the Cámara de Comercio e Industrias del Sur (CCIS), Mario Hernán Argeñal, tells La Tribuna restoring Zelaya to power would be “counterproductive.” Also, Reuters has a new report this morning on human rights abuses that have occurred in Honduras since the June 28 coup. The news service says human rights groups have attributed at least 10 deaths to the coup regime crackdowns [the government continues to say that just three people have died in protests]. And the Honduran human rights group Cofadeh, whose own offices were attacked with tear gas by security forces two days after Zelaya’s return, has documented “numerous reports of police firing guns in poor areas of Tegucigalpa,” often occurring during evening curfew.
Finally, there was an article in Tiempo Sunday that is worth reading in full. In the piece, an Afro-Honduran community leader speaks with the paper and discusses the problems of marginalization, poverty, and social exclusion which remain endemic in Honduras. “We reiterate our condemnation of the coup and we call for national reconciliation, for a reform of electoral laws and for the convening of a plebiscite so that the citizenry can decide on a new constitution,” says Céleo Alvarez Casildo. The possibility that such a reform process might have begun was used to justify the ouster of Zelaya in late June. And while Zelaya has said he would not advocate a constitutional assembly should he be reinstated, the issue still appears to resonate deeply with many who have supported the ousted leader over the last three and a half months.
Around the region this morning:
· The AP reports that world-famous Cuban blogger, Yoani Sanchez, is not being allowed to travel to New York to receive a journalism award from Columbia University. Cuban authorities earlier denied Sanchez permission to fly to Madrid to accept the Ortega y Gasset Prize in digital journalism for the creation of her blog “Generacion Y”, which gets more than 1 million hits per month.
· Also, on Cuba, in the Miami Herald there is a report on a series of congressional bills being discussed that would open up US-Cuba travel. If passed, “There would be an explosion of contacts between Americans and Cubans . . . that would almost overshadow what the two governments are doing,” says Phil Peters, a Cuba expert with the D.C.-based Lexington Institute.
· The New York Times reported yesterday on the closure of a state-run electric company that has provided power to much of Mexico City. The company, Luz y Fuerza del Centro, was said to have been operating “inefficiently.” The closure has set off massive labor protests led by the Mexican Electrical Workers Union.
· As Spain’s El País reports, indigenous protests and roadblocks in Guatemala turned violent in certain areas surrounding Guatemala City Monday after a driver shot and killed one protestor. Two other activists were seriously injured with gunshot wounds.
· El País also reports on Colombia, writing that Alvaro Uribe remains favored to win a third term as President “despite a growing number of disasters.”
· Finally, Bloomberg News writes that George Soros has announced he will invest $1 billion in clean energy technology and donate $100 million to an “environmental advisory group to aide policymakers.” According to the report, monies will be distributed through Soros’s new, San Francisco-based Climate Policy Initiative.
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