Arcadia Foundation

Honduran President Roberto Micheletti has called for ousted Manuel Zelaya to rejoin dialogue to form a unity government, though the deposed leader quickly responded by declaring the offer a “non-starter.”

“The government of Honduras reiterates its readiness to proceed with the implementation of the agreement and urges the other side to return to the dialogue framework to enable the formation of a government of national unity and reconciliation,” Micheletti said through a spokesman.

Zelaya, ousted in a coup in June, however later told Radio Globo that the deal was a “non-starter” because Micheletti had failed to reinstate him and his ministers.The US-brokered deal to end the nation’s four-month crisis collapsed last week when Zelaya pulled out, after Micheletti announced a new “unity” government without his participation.

Presidential elections due on November 29 are in jeopardy as Zelaya called for his supporters to boycott them and return to the streets of the polarized nation.

Zelaya, still holed up in the Brazilian embassy after making a surprise return to the capital in September, told AFP earlier that there was no point continuing with negotiations because “the agreements have been constantly violated.”

The accord had given Zelaya and Micheletti’s camps until midnight last Thursday to set up a reconciliation government to represent both sides.

Although it did not require that Zelaya be reinstated, the pact said that decision should be left to Congress, without setting a deadline for the vote, which has not yet taken place.

The trial of key Zimbabwe opposition figure Roy Bennett was adjourned in the Harare High Court Monday so the judge can deliberate the admissibility of evidence allegedly gathered through torture.

The state’s star witness Mike Hitschmann, who was convicted of the illegal possession of weapons in 2007, alleges that he was tortured into implicating Bennett in a coup plot.

Bennett’s lawyer, Trust Maanda, said the state insists on using the statement Hitschmann says he made under duress as evidence showing Bennett planned to overthrow President Robert Mugabe in 2006.

“He has disowned that statement and does not want to testify for the state,” Maanda has stated. The judge is expected to make his ruling on Wednesday.
Bennett — an aide to Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai and treasurer general for the Movement for Democratic Change — faces charges including terrorism and sabotage.

The trial comes at a critical time in Zimbabwe. The Southern African Development Community has instructed Mugabe and Tsvangirai to resolve their differences in 30 days.

China has executed nine people convicted of violent crimes during ethnic rioting in the far western Xinjiang region in July, the first to be put to death over the unrest, the China News Service said Monday.

Almost 200 people died in the rioting between Uighurs and Han Chinese, which was the worst ethnic violence in decades in the majority Muslim region.

The nine were executed after a judicial review by the country’s supreme court, the semi-official news agency said on its website. It did not give further details.

Death sentences have previously been announced for nine people, and suspended death sentences, which are often commuted to life sentences, for another three.

Judging by their names, at least two of those sentenced were Han Chinese, while the others appeared to be Uighurs, a Turkic ethnic group that calls Xinjiang its homeland.

Dilxat Raxit, a spokesman for the exiled World Uyghur Congress, condemned the executions and said the government had denied the prisoners’ rights by denying them a final visit from their families.

“They have not respected Chinese law in the trials or in carrying out the sentencing. This is not justice. We believe that the United States and Europe have not put enough pressure on China to resolve this issue,” Raxit said.

Twenty people were indicted Monday on charges related to the deaths of 18 people, destruction of property and other crimes during the rioting, the China News Service added.

Comments