Political Unrest in Honduras (VIDEO)

Military forces take their own President captive in this Central American country.

(SALEM, Ore.) - Honduran President Jose Manuel "Mel" Zelaya is in Costa Rica after losing control of the country during a coup d'etat Sunday led by Army soldiers.

The coup came just before a vote on a constitutional referendum; a matter the Honduran Supreme Court had ruled illegal. The country's constitution was adopted in 1982 and last amended in 1999.

Zelaya's drive to see Honduras host Democratic elections led to the revolt. The political position he took on the issue, ultimately placed him at odds with the military, the courts and the legislature.

President Zelaya vowed on Thursday to ignore the Supreme Court ruling ordering him to reinstate a military chief he had fired, top military commander, Gen. Romeo Vásquez Velásquez, who reportedly told the president that he would have to comply with the orders of the Supreme Court.

That disagreement escalated tensions in the days leading up to the constitution-changing referendum that had been scheduled for Sunday.

The Website Honduras.com, which appears to be on the side of the new political occupation, writes, "The amazing, and wonderful part about it is that there has been no violence in the streets or riots."

But Al Jazeera reports that the streets of Honduras are scenes of tanks and military forces moving around, and that radio stations are advising people to stay off the streets.

In their suggestion that life is normal, Honduras.com states, "Watching the Honduran Seleccion, and reveling in the fact that Honduras won over Panamama 2-0. The Honduran people are all about peace. Today is a living monument to that fact."

In other countries they take to the streets when Democracy fails. Look at the recent events in Iran, little else needs to be said.

The idea of sports being more important than the loss of a country's political structure certainly seems like a stretch; in fact the coup d'etat is being outwardly condemned by many world leaders.

President "Mel" Zelaya, while being interviewed in Costa Rica, says he believes the group that stormed the capitol and knocked the door of his home in while taking him away at gunpoint, is only a small band of the Army, representing the interests of a few who strongly oppose his ambitions.

One person objecting loudly to the new possibly anti-Democratic military takeover and stronghold in Honduras, is Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. He instantly blamed the matter on the "Yankees in the North" and called for President Obama to come out publicly over the matter.

President Chavez has good reason to be suspicious about the motives and tactics of the Americans. You could attribute his ill at ease to the U.S. government's history in supporting his temporary ousting in a similar coup d'etat in 2002.

Post-9/11 America had its attention focused on Afghanistan and Iraq and people were mostly uninformed of the fact that their nation tried to illegally topple an elected president.

Chavez is despised by Republican politicians and petroleum companies because he snatched control of oil from the companies who hit you up for four bucks a gallon at the gas pumps while lining their pockets with bonuses.

Many criticize Chavez, but the poor and middle class populations of Venezuela widely support him.

During the CIA-sponsored coup d'etat against Venezuela in 2002, FOX News was amazing on the scene, almost instantly reigning in the "new" president of Venezuela whose term of office lasted exactly two days.

That's right, it took two days for hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people to fill the streets of Caracas and demand the return of their kidnapped President. The CIA apparently had him on a Central American island.

President Chavez quickly resumed office and he actually forgave most of the people in his country who participated in his temporary demise. He didn't forgive the U.S. involvement in undermining his presidency in the name of oil money, I'm pretty sure. This is seriously important history for Americans to know and understand. Chavez's saga is in this story, and if you have time it contains a riveting video. (see: Taking Government Control of Media by the Horns: Hugo Chavez and Venezuela - Op-Ed by Tim King Salem-News.com)

Xinhua news agency reports that Chavez also lashed out publicly over attacks on the Venezuelan, Cuban and Nicaraguan ambassadors in the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa. These attacks on public officials reportedly took place in conjunction with the coup. In fact, ticotimes.net Daily News reported from Managua, Nicaragua Sunday, that the presidents of the Central American Integration System (SICA) are expected to issue a joint declaration Monday in support of the recently deposed Honduran President.

Chavez had harsh, threatening words, "If our ambassador or embassy were attacked, that would be de facto beginning a war."

He said during a Sunday broadcast of the TV show Alo Presidente that "Venezuela's National Armed Forces have been put on alert."

Venezuela's ambassador to Honduras, Armando Laguna, had just told Venezuelan television channel Telesur that he was "beaten by hooded Honduran soldiers, with counterparts Juan Carlos Hernandez, of Cuba, and Mario Duarte, of Nicaragua," Xinhua reported.

Chavez was clear that it would not recognize the Honduras coup, or any other government that was not led by Zelaya.

He is not alone is this part of the world. Different alliances like the Boliviarian Alternative for the Americas, the South American Union of Nations, and the Caribbean Economic Community were working in solidarity with Honduras.

Chavez joins people like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in calling for the restoration of the Honduran President.

Her words were strong and direct Sunday, "The action taken against Honduran President Mel Zelaya violates the precepts of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, and thus should be condemned by all. We call on all parties in Honduras to respect the constitutional order and the rule of law, to reaffirm their democratic vocation, and to commit themselves to resolve political disputes peacefully and through dialogue."

Clinton says little time has passed since the very rules at hand were adopted. "Honduras must embrace the very principles of democracy we reaffirmed at the OAS meeting it hosted less than one month ago," she said in a statement issued by the State Department.

Democracies like the United States and Venezuela, along with other world powers, will likely keep the political pressure on the people currently in control of Honduras.

The President of the UN General Assembly, Miguel D’Escoto, has called on the different parties to resolve their differences peacefully and through dialogue.

Mr. D’Escoto told a news conference in New York that he thought the "ugly days" of military coups and the interruption of democratic processes were over.

“We hope that it will be resolved soon for the good of the people of Honduras and of the whole region,” he stated.

It is not clear exactly who is in control of Honduras at this point. The reports below offer different insight and interpretations of what is taking place in this Central American Country.

In this report from Al Jazeera English, Mariana Sanchez reports from the Central American nation's military central command on who might be named the interim president:

Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor.
Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines. Tim holds numerous awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), the first place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several other awards including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting. Serving the community in very real terms, Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website, affiliated with Google News and several other major search engines and news aggregators.
You can send Tim an email at this address: newsroom@salem-news.com

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mrs thang July 16, 2009 10:32 am (Pacific time)

yall r some crazy people

Eddie Zawaski July 2, 2009 5:54 pm (Pacific time)

Thanks, Tim. This is hands down the best story on the Honduran political crisis anywhere in North America. You covered nearly all the issues and presented some of the other side. That "other side" is the issue I'd like to address to add a bit to your story. The so-called interim government in Nicaragua is free to say whatever it wants about what is going on today in Tegucigalpa because they have shut down the internet and the electricity. A legal open democratic government would not do that. They have imposed a curfew from 9pm to 6am, something that an illegal military coup would certainly do. They claim to have conducted a legal and constitutional transfer of power, something that all illegal regimes assert. The striking thing about the coup's claim to legality is the impunity of it. It's so easy to see through it, yet they still boldly assert a legal right to have seized the government. The Supreme Court ordered the arrest and expulsion of the president, they say. One would think that the court might have the authority to bring charges against the president or perhaps even bring him to trial for alleged crimes. But when a court can issue a secret order to have the head of state rustled out of the country in his pyjamas at the point of a gone, we no longer have any semblance of democratic process, Now, it may be written in to the Honduran constitution that the supreme court has among its duties, the duty to kidnap the president when he displeases them. If this is so, then that constitution is sorely in need of change. From what I've read of the situation, changing the constitution was what President Zelaya was attempting when he got shipped off to Costa Rica. Clearly, this coup was brought about by the Honduran oligarchy, the people who who whatever they want because they can. They call it whatever they please because at the end of the day they own the media and damn near everything else in the country. While people in the United States are still debating about whether or not we have an oligarchy, people in Latin America KNOW they have a ruling elite, an elite that prefers to control through economic means, but uses force when they feel they must. This is why all of Honduras' neighbors in Latin America have reacted so strongly against the coup. They see this event not as a legal action taken by several branches of the Honduran government, but as a conspiracy carried out by government officials to remove that pesky irritant to their bosses' hold on the nation. The three countries who had their ambassadors roughed up were not the only ones offended by the coup's impunity. Indignation resonates clear down to deep Patagonia where I write from today and where people fervently root for their government to take a leading role in bringing President Zelaya back to Honduras. Thus far, the response of the US has been no action and lukewarm rhetoric opposed to the coup. America can do better and has an opportunity to do better right at this critical moment. The honduran crisis can be an opportunity for the US to reverse much of the damage done to it's image in the region over the last fifty years. It would be very easy. Here's my proposal: Since several heads of state are committed to flying into Honduras to escort Zelaya back to power, the US can help and Obama doesn't have to make the trip. Simply allow the charter flight with Zelaya, Ortega, Chavez, Correa, and Christina Fernandez land at the US Air Base near the capital. The Honduran Army can't arrest Zelaya there. US troops could then convoy President Zelaya back to his office where he could meet his accusers on neutral ground in the presence of witnesses. Then, we might expect some sort of constitutional or legal outcome from this conflict between Zelaya and his critics.

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