Honduras talks to resume on Tuesday

October 11, 2009 08:54:47 AM

• A⁺ 
• A^-
• |
• 
• |
• 
• |
• 

Dialogue between deposed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya and the de facto government began a three-day pause Saturday, prolonging uncertainty in the almost four-month standoff that followed a June coup.

The resumption of talks on Tuesday will come just two days before the October 15 deadline given by the Zelaya camp for his unconditional restitution.

Negotiators meanwhile reported a modicum of progress Saturday with agreement on dismissing amnesty for the coup leaders from the negotiating agenda, and the possible creation of a joint cabinet.

The two issues remain in limbo however as both two camps remained deadlocked on the main point of Zelaya's return.

"Tuesday will be decisive, and we expect an announcement on Wednesday," a diplomatic source close to the discussions, who asked not to be named, told AFP.

"I do not understand the three-day break," Xiomara Castro, Zelaya's wife, told AFP from within the Brazilian embassy where the deposed leader has been holed up since his surprise return to the capital on September 21.

"When there's persecution, repression, the minutes and hours count. (The pause) is a way to delay the process, with time passing and the president still not returning to power," she said.

A diplomatic delegation from the Organization of American States left Honduras Thursday without resolving a months-old political impasse between de facto leader Roberto Micheletti and Zelaya, whose overthrow in the June 28 coup has paralyzed the Central American country.