First Lady Xiomara Castro de Zelaya returned last night to Tegucigalpa after her trip to Managua with her husband, President Zelaya.  Zelaya had met with US Ambassador Hugo Llorens there.  Upon her return, she addressed a crowd of supporters:

"Yesterday, the State Department sent a very clear message to the President of the Republic, that he is the only President of the Republic of Honduras they recognize. They went to find him to tell him, 'there is an ultimatum that has been given to the coup regime. If they do not step down, we are going to have to act.'"

Meanwhile, the Golpistas are threatening to revoke the visas of the US Embassy team.  Interesting, they did that with the Venezuelan Embassy last week, but the ambassador and his team ignored it, since it didn't come from a recognized government.  I don't know if Llorens and his staff would leave - but there are 600 US troops and some significant firepower a few clicks away at the airbase.

Al Giorano of Narconews arrived in Honduras yesterday, and has posted today's stories.  Not a pretty picture.

Mass arrests of 156 protestors at Cuesta de la Virgen, 3 seriously wounded.  Possible crackdowns in other parts of the country. 

School teacher shot in head in Tegucigalpa demonstration. 

88 arrests, 25 wounded at El Durazno.  Independent Part Presidential Candidate Carlos Reyes arrested and beaten- broken arm and injured ear.  Union leader Juan Barahona arrested.

Here's the link.

But Michelleti  doesn't seem to have the power and has asked for a mediator to come to Honduras to convince the rabid right golpistas.

1. The four Golpistas who have had their visas revoked by State:

Ramón Custodio - Human Rights Commissioner (in charge of repressing journalism)
Alfredo Saavedra - President of Congress (replaced Michelleti)
Adolo Sevila - Secretary of Defense
Tomás Arita Valle - Supreme Court Justice who signed Zelaya's removal by the military order.

2 Honduran First Lady Xiomara Castro Zelaya and her kids were blocked from joining her husband on the border, but the military has now let her pass.  Unverified - Red Cross vehicles are not let through the checkpoints, but one that was waived through was hauling tear gas (violation of the Geneva Covention).

3. Back to Justice Arita Valle, looking at the 86 page document release pertaining to to the arrest order against President Zelaya - the actual orders (there were two) charged Zelaya with improperly firing General Vasquez (no mention of an illegal "referedum.")    While Zelaya had the constitutional authority to fire Vazquez, he may have failed to follow proper procedure.  Raj's analysis is here.

4. First signs of coup virus spreading in Central America.  Anti-Ortega government folks were on their way to deliver  a letter to Zelaya telling him to get the hell out of Nicarauga, but they were blocked on the highway by one hundred or so Sandinista supporters.  Hey, we have to go to friggen China to get news about Latin America.

5. Roberto Michelleti has asked God to intervene on his behalf:

"I ask for forgiveness from those who for one reason or another do not agree with us, and I ask God to show them the light so they realize it is more important to live in peace," Micheletti said.

"I am here not because men put me here, I am here because God put me here," he said.

"I want the best for my country," Micheletti said. "I believe that up to this moment, I have no reason to be humbled before any man, but before God permanently, because I have acted correctly in my life."

6. And of course our Republicans are going ballistic .

US revokes visas of four interim Honduran officials

(AFP) - 29 minutes ago

WASHINGTON -- The United States said Tuesday it has revoked the diplomatic visas of four interim Honduran government members to show it recognizes ousted president Manuel Zelaya and not the new leadership.

The United States is currently "reviewing the diplomatic visas" of all interim government members, as well as visas for their families, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters.

"We have already revoked diplomatic visas issued to four such individuals," Kelly told reporters, adding the move was taken by the US embassy in Tegucigalpa.

"These individuals received their diplomatic visas in connection with positions held prior to June 28 under the Zelaya administration, but who now serve the de facto regime."

Meanwhile, in Honduras, Congress is stalling as much as possible in reaching a decision about the Arias proposal (which in reality just may be the "Clinton" proposal), including further moves to refer the matter to the Supreme Court.  This move by the Obama Administration represents a MAJOR upgrade in sanctions against the Golpistas - personal sanctions.  It is a shot across the bow, in my opinion.  And I think it is aimed directly at the Honduran congress persons to cease and desist pussy-footing around the decisions on the San José accord.

I did comment recently that Bush v. Gore was an example of an absurd Supreme Court ruling.  I wasn't thinking - it can also serve as an example of a coup d' etat.

That's what the Honduran Armed Forces thinks.  They've just published a 156 page pdf file on their web site explaining the coup which is not a coup, and after a chronology there is a faq section, and a question there:  Was this novel in political history?

The Armed Forces answered "No" and cited Bush v. Gore as a precedent.

At the link Raj also translates the single piece of evidence against Zelaya - a flyer concerning the reasons behind the fourth ballot box.

Here's what it promotes; notice the entire absence of any discussion of term limits, continuing in office longer than his elected term, dissolving Congress, the Supreme Court, or the command of the Armed Forces, which elsewhere (p. 15) in the Armed Forces document they claim was the real goal of the exercise; instead, what the Zelaya government proposed was ensuring the rights of women, of the multiple ethnic groups now recognized in Honduras, and the expansion of human rights to include "third and fourth generation" rights-- in other words, bringing the Honduran constitution into conformity with international treaties, just as Minister of Culture Rodolfo Pastor Fasquelle previously noted:

"In deconstruction, the critic claims there is no meaning to be found in the actual text, but only in the various, often mutually irreconcilable, 'virtual texts' constructed by readers in their search for meaning" (Rebecca Goldstein).

Saturday's NYT story concerning the Honduran military's communiqué, which is irreconcilable with the public position stated by the Coup government (golpistas), is quite mysterious.  Here's the document in its original Spanish taken from the Military's we site:

FUERZAS ARMADAS DE HONDURAS
SECRETARIA DE ESTADO EN EL DESPACHO DE DEFENSA NACIONAL
DIRECCIÓN DE RELACIONES PÚBLICAS
COMUNICADO No. 7

La Secretaria de Estado en el Despacho de Defensa Nacional, ante los últimos acontecimientos suscitados, a la opinión pública nacional e internacional comunica lo siguiente:

1. Que las Fuerzas Armadas son respetuosas de la Constitución y de las Leyes, por lo cual reafirmamos nuestra subordinación a la autoridad civil en consecuencia con los principios de legalidad y obediencia debida.

2. Que como institución respaldamos una solución a la problemática que atraviesa nuestro país, mediante un proceso de negociación en el marco del Acuerdo de San José. Así mismo, reiteramos nuestro apoyo irrestricto a los resultados de la misma, conforme a nuestra Constitución y demás Leyes.

3. Las Fuerzas Armadas como institución nacional cumple y seguirá cumpliendo las misiones que le señala la Constitución y las Leyes de la República .

COMAYAGUELA, M.D.C. 24 DE JULIO DE 2009.

And here's a translation, courtesey of Raj @ Honduras Coup 2009:

ARMED FORCES OF HONDURAS
SECRETARY OF STATE OFFICE OF NATIONAL DEFENSE
OFFICE OF PUBLIC RELATIONS
COMMUNIQUE NO. 7

The Secretary of State Office of National Defense, in view of the latest suspected developments, communicates the following to national and international public opinion:

1. That the Armed Forces are respectful of the Constitution and of the Laws, whereby we reaffirm our subordination to civil authority in keeping with the principles of legality and due obedience.

2. That as an institution we back a solution to the problematic situation that spans our country, through a process of negotiation on the framework of the San Jose Accords. Likewise, we reiterate our unrestricted support for the results of the same, in conformity with our Constitution and other laws.

3. The Armed Forces as a national institution fulfills and will continue to fulfill the missions that the Constitution and the Laws of the Republic have indicated for it.

Comayaguela, M.D.C. 24 of July, 2009

What I find mysterious is the origin of this document - it was not forged in the halls of the High Command in Tegucigalpa, but rather by Honduran Colonels in Washington, under the tutelege of unnamed congressional aids. According to the Times article cited above:

The communiqué was drafted in Washington after days of talks between mid-level Honduran officers and American Congressional aides. Posted on the Honduran Armed Forces Web site, it endorsed the so-called San José Accord that was forged in Costa Rica by delegates representing President Zelaya and the man who heads the de facto Honduran government, Roberto Micheletti.

(FYI, Raj also has posted a translation of the San José Accord.)

I'd sure like to know who's congressional aides were involved.  But regardless, I'm trying to grasp this: our congress people are assisting representives of a foreign country's military institution forge a schism between that military and the de fact government it allegedly serves.

Raj's comments are good on this issue.  He compares this communiqué with earlier communiqués that the military has issued since the coup, which all seem to add up to an Out, Damned Spot! declaration with regard to the military's participation in the coup.  But two of his grafs really caught my attention:

So the Armed Forces statement does not necessarily mean that the critical breakthrough has happened, but together with other signs, is part of an emerging picture of reluctance by the military (police and Armed Forces) to be the fall guys for civilian incompetence. I read the Armed Forces statement as a warning to the civil government, to get back to the mediation and stop being so intransigent. It is in effect-- and as its inclusion in a numbered sequence of communiqués suggests-- the Armed Forces' expression of continued discomfort with the position in which they have been put by a civilian government that was so misguided as to expect the world community to accept a coup d'etat.

(On the question of why the coup plotters were so mistaken, the Honduran scholars I talked with in Costa Rica this week suggest that the coup group lacked anyone with real knowledge of contemporary world politics. In the absence of such a knowledgable person, they argued that Enrique Ortez Colindres-- notorious now for his racist remarks about President Obama-- was able to project an aura of confidence and knowledge, primarily through his facility as a speaker, albeit one whose ideas are both retrograde and uninformed.)

Yes, incompetence...an idea that has surfaced in my thoughts on more than one occassion as I have been trying to digest the meaning of this Coup d' Etat.  In the sense of you're doing a heckofva job, Brownie, it looks like incompetence is being institutionalized by the golpistas, and the perfect example of that is the fate of the Honduran Ministry of Culture.

After he coup the minister of culture, Dr. Rodolfo Pastor Fasquelle went into hiding in Mexico.  He was in Washington at the time of the coup, and word got out that all of Zelaya's cabinent oficials had arrest warrents.  Some were arrested, while other fled the country or went "underground" in Honduras.  Dr. Pastor Fasquelle is a respected historian and influencial intellectual in Central America.  HIs charge under the Ministry of Culture includes management of the important archaeological zones of Honduras, relations with Honduran ethnic and indigenous communities, management of the National Archives, Libraries and "bookmobile" type projects.

The golpistas replaced Pastor Fasquelle with Mirna Castro.  Castro's bona fides in cultural ministerial affairs is that she is a washed-up TV personality and a militant anti-abortion crusader.  Here she is in a film clip asking the other branches of the golpista government for help in her new cultural project of purging "revolutionary" and "subversive" literature from Honduran libraries and schools.

The de facto regime, in addition to the great blunder with the naming of its first Chancellor (he of the celebrated phrases, pearls of Honduran diplomacy, like the racist phrase directed at Obama), is giving another example of the intellectual level of its functionaries. In a recent appearance, Mirna Castro, brand-new minister of "culture" - of unknown resume in scientific, artistic, or literary subject matter - in front of television cameras of the world, showed that never in her life has she opened a book: she condemned as subversive fundamental works in the literary heritage of the country.  [link]

This is all quite mondo bizarro.  Just so you'll know, the document produced by the Colonels in Washington is not a coup within the ranks of the Honduran Military.  Honcho General Romeo Vazquez himself more or less backed up the Arias plan in a recent Radio Golpo interview. 

Xiomara Zelaya (to General Vasquez): "In the first place, your troops came in shooting... second, no arrest or search warrant was presented... it was 6:15 in the morning... later you said that an arrest and search warrant had been presented, but we, as a family, know it's not true... You violated all the rights of the President... I would like to say to the General with all due respect... what security do we have? The eyes of the people, especially those trying to get the border, want to know what is happening... We want to meet with our husband, our father, our son, who we have missed for so many days... my question is 'what is happening? Why don't you let us through?' You left the family of Manuel Zelaya blocked on the highway...."

Vasquez responds by passing the buck, "The Army is only in support of the National Police," blaming it all on the police... Offers a helicopter to transport the Zelaya family to Nicaragua... "This is not personal..."

Radio Announcer, by the name of Eduardo (to General Vasquez): "You remember that this radio was invaded by soldiers... what guarantees of safety do you have for us?"

Vasquez: "We have pain in our heart... We are ready to dialogue... And we the Honduran people can end up united...."

Xiomara: "Yes, agreements are necessary. And the military has to stop repressing the people... They're offering us a helicopter but I fear, sincerely, what could happen to our lives in a helicopter of the Armed Forces... May our family be reunited, not to stay in Nicaragua... and for our security to be guaranteed also to be with the Honduran people in this struggle...."

The General stays on the line, talking nervously but not responding directly to the questions, claiming that the Armed Forces only follows orders and is not responsible for anything... the radio announcer bids the general and the First Lady goodnight at four minutes before the hour...

I can't keep up with the updates that are appearing on the Internet this morning as I write this blog.   The latest, coming again from Raj, is that the San José Accord itself originated in Washington, not Costa Rica, at the hand of an unidentified U.S. Senator. 

My Cental American colleagues with whom I discussed Arias' original plan last week described even the original as not really a product of mediation, noting rumors that a US senator had brought Arias a draft. They already felt that this version, which was not fully public at the time, went too far in presuming the offenses Zelaya was accused of were real, and requiring him to renounce them, while demoting from its more prominent place the insistence that Zelaya is the constitutional president and his restoration is non-negotiable. I wonder what they are saying now about the actual wording of the critical point concerning his restitution, which entirely abandons the firmness of the constitutional basis for his restoration-- a basis which does not exist for the proposal to let those responsible for the coup, currently occupying positions in the de facto regime and abusing them to engage in purges of government civil servants, return to their former congressional posts.

I'll leave it at that.  Any further devlopments can be addressed as they unfold.