Zelaya Vows to Stay in Brazil Embassy ‘Until the End’ (Update2)

By Blake Schmidt and Eric Sabo

Dec. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya vowed to stay at the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa “until the end” after the interim government refused to let him leave the country as long as he claims a right to power.

“I could be here for 10 more years,” Zelaya told Radio Globo.

The government of acting President Roberto Micheletti rejected Zelaya’s request to leave Honduras as a “guest of honor,” Cesar Caceres, a Micheletti spokesman, said in a phone interview. Micheletti instead offered Zelaya, who faces charges of fraud and treason, permission to leave as a political asylum seeker, which would require him to relinquish all claims to the presidency, Caceres said. Zelaya refused the offer.

Micheletti, speaking at a military ceremony today, called on governments to “respect the sovereignty of our small country.”

Mexico’s government has been trying to negotiate a way for Zelaya to visit the country, and yesterday sent a plane to Honduras to pick up Zelaya. The plane was redirected to El Salvador as Zelaya and the acting government failed to agree on terms for his departure. Mexico’s Foreign Ministry, in an e- mailed statement, said it was acting upon a request from Zelaya.

The U.S., which brokered an accord to end the crisis, supports installing a unity government and forming a truth commission to investigate the events that led to Zelaya’s overthrow, State Department spokesman Philip J. Crowley said.

“The decision as to whether President Zelaya decides to stay at the Brazilian Embassy or eventually accept the opportunity to move to another country, that’s ultimately his decision,” Crowley told reporters in Washington today.

Forced At Gunpoint

The Honduran military forced Zelaya out of the country at gunpoint June 28 after the Supreme Court ruled his bid to hold a vote on rewriting the constitution was illegal. Zelaya’s removal was condemned by the United Nations and the Organization of American States.

Honduran cattle rancher Porfirio Lobo won the country’s Nov. 29 presidential elections scheduled before Zelaya’s removal. Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela have refused to recognize the result because Zelaya was never restored to power as part of a U.S.-brokered deal to end the political crisis.

The U.S. congratulated Lobo for what Arturo Valenzuela, the State Department’s top diplomat in Latin America, called an “ample victory.” The elections were a significant step toward restoring democracy after the coup, Valenzuela said Nov. 30.

“I could have left yesterday with the impositions that the dictatorship wanted, but I’m firm in resisting and am not going to renounce something the people gave me,” Zelaya told Radio Globo.

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