ホンジュラス関係 昨日のTHE JAPAN TIMESの記事です。
Honduran talks snag on unity government
Micheletti rejects deal to reinstate ousted president, offer amnesty
San Jose
AP
Talks to resolve Honduras’political crisis deadlocked Saturday over a proposal to reinstate ousted
President Manuel Zelaya and form a national unity government, leading the mediator to appeal for more
flexibility when negotiations resumed Sunday.
Zelaya had threatened to declare the negotiations in Costa Rica a failure if a deal was not reached
to return him to the presidency by midnight Saturday. But his representatives said they will give the
talks at least one more day, even though they say the Zelaya still plans to return to Honduras with or
without an agreement.
Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, who is mediating the U.S.-backed talks, said both sides agreed to
attend Sunday’s talks, but remained far apart.
“There are certainly many differences. We have to make an effort to be more flexible,”Arias said
after the end of Saturday’s round of talks. The Costa Rican president won the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize
for helping end Central America’s civil wars.
Zelaya negotiator Rixi Moncada said her side would extend the talks after the government of interim
President Roberto Michelettiasked for more time to study Arias’s proposal, which included a national
unity government headed by Zelaya, a general amnesty and early elections, among other things.
Zelaya was hustled out of Honduras by soldiers in a June 28 coup, launching a major test of Latin
American democracy and of the Obama administration’s policy toward the region.
He was vowed to return to Honduras to set up a parallel government, although he has refused to say
when or how he will enter the country. His aide, Allan Fajardo, would say only that Zelaya planned to
return before Friday, the date suggested by Arias for his return.
The Honduran military thwarted Zelaya’s attempt to fly home july 5 by blocking the runway at the
airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa.
As talks began Saturday, Arias issued a statement proposing a plan that would let Zelaya serve out
the final months of his term, move up elections by one month to late October, grant amnesty for all
political crimes committed before and after the June 28 coup, and include representatives of the main
political parties in a reconciliation government.
He said Zelaya would have to cede control of the military to an electoral court a month before the
elections to ensure impartiality and also renounce his plan to hold a referendum on retooling the
constitution, which was the spark that launched the coup after the Supreme Court, military and Congress
all objected to the vote, An international commission would monitor compliance with the accord.
When asked about the idea of having Zelaya return to Honduras as president with a reconciliation
government, Assistant Foreign Minister Martha Lorena Alvarado gave a one-word response: “Impossible.”
Her comment in Honduras’capital, Tegucigalpa, was the clearest indication that the talks had
deadlocked.
“The reinstatement of Zelaya, as we have maintained and now repeat, is not negotiable. . . . There
is no possibility of him returning to Honduras as president,”Alvarado said.
A Zelaya representative, Enrique Flores, said his side had accepted Arias’plan “in principle”but
added that the government led by Micheletti was balking at the key point – allowing Zelaya’s return to
power. He said that would kill the negotiations.
Before Alvarado’s rejection, a representative of Honduras’interim government said her delegation
lacked the authority to accept most of Arias’ proposals, since decisions on amnesty, changed election
dates and permission for Zelaya to return despite warrants for his arrest needed the approval of
Honduras’s courts or Congress.
