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Central and South American leaders from L-R: Nicaragua's President Daniel Ortega, Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez and Ecuador's President Rafael Correa - Source: Reuters -
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Leftist Latin American leaders rallied around ousted Honduran
President Manuel Zelaya and tried to thrash out a response to an
army coup that sparked protests in the impoverished nation and drew
worldwide condemnation.
Pro-Zelaya demonstrators defied an overnight curfew and held a
vigil by the presidential palace in Tegucigalpa, while Venezuela's
firebrand President Hugo Chavez led talks with Zelaya and other
allies in neighboring Nicaragua.
The coup is the biggest political crisis to hit Central America in
years and will test US President Barack Obama as he tries to mend
Washington's battered image in Latin America.
The Obama administration called for Zelaya's return to office as
legitimate president of Honduras, placing itself in the same camp
as a group of leftist governments that are at ideological
loggerheads with the United States.
The Organization of American States demanded Zelaya's immediate
return, saying no other government would be recognized.
Tension mounted this week when Zelaya, a Chavez ally, angered the
Honduran Congress, Supreme Court and army by pushing for a public
vote to gauge support for changing the constitution to let
presidents seek re-election beyond a single four-year term.
Before he could hold the poll on Sunday, the Honduran military
seized Zelaya in his pajamas and flew him to Costa Rica in Central
America's first successful army coup since the Cold War.
"We cannot allow a return to the past. We will not permit it,"
thundered Chavez, a champion of Latin American socialism who
survived an attempted army coup in 2002 and who has put his troops
on alert in case Honduras moved against his embassy.
Flanked by Zelaya, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa and
Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega, Chavez denied that he was launching an
invasion.
"We are here to support, respecting the sovereignty of
Honduras," he said in Managua.
Bolivia's Evo Morales and OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza
were due to join the group in Managua later on Monday and
Washington said it was following the crisis closely.
Honduras was a US ally in the 1980s when Washington helped Central
American governments fight Marxist rebels and the United States
still keeps some 600 troops at a Honduran base used for
humanitarian and disaster relief operations.
Pulled to the left since Zelaya took power in 2006, Honduras was
left isolated as the United States, the European Union and a string
of other governments backed Zelaya.
Protests spark panic-buying
In Honduras, a curfew was imposed for Sunday and Monday nights by
Roberto Micheletti, who Congress named as interim president within
hours of the coup.
Micheletti said no foreign leader had the right to threaten
Honduras.
Many people in Tegucigalpa cowered at home, scared there would be
violence.
Shops saw panic-buying and many people drew out cash or
shuttered businesses.
A small group of pro-Zelaya protesters had vowed to spend the night
in front of the presidential palace, however.
On Sunday shots were fired, apparently into the air, near
barricades of chain link fences and downed billboards erected by
the protesters to block off the presidential palace. Some
demonstrators were masked and wielding sticks.
Troops in full fatigues with automatic weapons lined the inside of
the fenced-off presidential palace.
Some covered their faces with riot gear shields as protesters
taunted them, and a tank sat nearby, its cannon facing the
crowd.
Honduras, an impoverished coffee, textile and banana exporter with
a population of seven million, had been politically stable since
the end of military rule in the early 1980s.
But Zelaya's close alliance with Chavez, and his efforts to lift
presidential term limits, upset the army and the traditionally
conservative rich elite.
Tensions peaked this week when Zelaya tried to fire the chief of
the armed forces and the Supreme Court overruled him.
The same court gave the army the order to oust the
president.
Hondurans are divided over the crisis.
Pro-Zelaya protesters burned a news stand selling newspapers that backed the coup and said pro-Zelaya television and radio channels had been cut.
But recent polls show overall support for Zelaya has dropped to
around 30% in recent months.
"Why did he call for constitutional changes? Because he wants to
follow in the footsteps of Chavez, he wants to stay in power. And
this hurts the country, it discourages investment," said Walter
Aguilera, who supported the coup.
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