TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Ousted President Manuel Zelaya said Saturday that he would return to Honduras to try to retake office after last week’s military-backed coup, despite warnings of a potentially bloody confrontation and the interim government’s vow to arrest him.
Honduras rebuffed demands by the international community to reinstate Zelaya in the name of constitutional order, thrusting the poor Central American nation deeper into political crisis and isolation.
The Organization of American States met in Washington to consider suspending Honduras’ membership because of the coup. Before the emergency session, though, Honduras’ interim government decided to pull out of the OAS rather than meet its ultimatum to restore Zelaya.
OAS Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza said his efforts to return Zelaya to the presidency had failed.
Minutes before Insulza’s report to a special meeting of foreign ministers, Zelaya said he was optimistic and is still planning to return today to his country a week after he was overthrown by a military coup.
Zelaya called on supporters to prepare to greet him at the airport today. On Saturday, more than 10,000 of them gathered near the heavily guarded presidential palace and pledged they would be ready if he returned.
“We are going to show up at the Honduras International Airport in Tegucigalpa . . . and on Sunday we will be in Tegucigalpa,” Zelaya said in a taped statement posted on the websites of the Telesur and Cubadebate media outlets.
In comments to a local radio station, Zelaya said Argentine President Cristina Fernandez and Ecuador’s Rafael Correa, several foreign ministers and 300 journalists would accompany him.
Zelaya implored supporters to remain peaceful. “Do not bring weapons,” he said. “Practice what I have always preached, which is nonviolence.”
