NYT

Honduran Congress Votes Down Return by Zelaya - NYT

By ELISABETH MALKIN

MEXICO CITY — The Honduran Congress voted Wednesday night against restoring the ousted president, Manuel Zelaya, to office to serve out the last two months of his term, throwing into further disarray an American-backed plan to end the country’s political crisis.

Congress voted 111-14 to ratify its decision on June 28 to vote Mr. Zelaya out of office after he had been arrested by the military and flown out of the country.

One by one, the lawmakers announced their votes. Congressman José Simón Azcona said it was best for the country “to turn the page and start anew.”

The vote was stipulated in an accord the United States helped broker a month ago that was signed by Mr. Zelaya and the de facto president, Roberto Micheletti.

The agreement had appeared to be a road map for a compromise between the feuding politicians. Once its conditions were met, American officials said, the accord would lead the international community to restore relations and economic aid to Honduras.

Congress’s vote came three days after a general election — set long before the political upheaval began — that was won by a veteran conservative politician, Porfirio Lobo. He is to take office as president on Jan. 27.

Mr. Zelaya, who has been hunkered down in the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, since September, appeared to believe when he signed the deal that he had enough votes in Congress to be restored to office to complete his term.

That misjudgment leaves his future in doubt. The de facto government has said that it will arrest him on charges of corruption and abuse of power if he leaves the embassy. Mr. Lobo has refused to say whether his government would pursue those charges once he took office.

The plan, which Mr. Micheletti agreed to only after senior Obama administration officials landed in Tegucigalpa to take charge of the talks, also called for both sides to form a unity government; it is not clear how that could now take place without Mr. Zelaya. The remaining step was the naming of a truth commission, which has not occurred.

On Monday, the day after the election, Arturo Valenzuela, the American assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, told reporters in Washington that for Honduras to return to the good graces of the international community, all of the accord’s conditions would have to be met.

But as the date grows closer for Mr. Lobo’s inauguration, the de facto government and its allies may feel less pressure to act on the agreement. Mr. Lobo won the election handily, and although only a few Latin American countries have recognized the result, many nations issued statements acknowledging that the vote went smoothly.

American officials have said privately that many countries will eventually move toward recognizing the results.

Mr. Zelaya had asked his supporters to boycott the vote. After offering conflicting estimates of the turnout on Sunday, the electoral board had not issued a confirmed figure by Wednesday.