WASHINGTON, (Reuters) – Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya yesterday accepted a U.S.-backed effort by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias to mediate an end to the political crisis in Honduras and said talks with his rivals would begin tomorrow.
“Our first meeting is set for Thursday, in Costa Rica,” Zelaya, told Honduran radio from Washington.
In Honduras, Roberto Micheletti, who was appointed president by Honduran lawmakers after the June 28 coup, also said he would attend tomorrow’s talks under Arias’ mediation.
Arias, a Nobel Peace Prize winner with experience in solving Central American conflicts, faces mediating between sharply opposed positions.
Zelaya said his reinstatement as president was nonnegotiable.
“What this is is not a negotiation, this is the planning of the exit of the coup leaders,” he said.
But Micheletti maintained his position that Zelaya could not return as president. “We’re not going to negotiate, we’re going to talk,” he said. “We’re going into these talks because we’re interested in having peace and tranquillity in Honduras.”
Zelaya, whose ouster was sparked by his efforts to change presidential term limits and by his political shift to the left, spoke after meeting U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
She urged him to negotiate rather than try to force his way back into the country.
Zelaya had tried to fly home on Sunday, but the interim government stopped his plane from landing. At least one person was killed when troops clashed with pro-Zelaya protesters who went to the airport in the capital, Tegucigalpa, to meet him.
The coup in the impoverished Central American coffee and textile exporter has been widely condemned abroad, and posed a diplomatic challenge for U.S. President Barack Obama.
The Organization of American States took the rare step to suspend Honduras on Saturday after Honduras’ interim authorities defied its ultimatum to reinstate Zelaya. But the group has failed to find a solution to the crisis.