Today’s State Dept. Briefing: Zelaya Coming to Washington Next Week?

PROTEST AGAINST US POLICY ON HONDURAS

US STATE DEPARTMENT, WASH. DC, JULY 28, 2009

Below is a short excerpt of today’s State Department Daily Briefing that pertains to Honduras.  In addition to President Zelaya’s travel plans, it also focuses on the application of sanctions against the golpista regime.

State Dept. Daily Briefing Thursday, August 27,2009 – Excerpt regarding Honduras

QUESTION: P.J., on Honduras, is President Zelaya coming here next week? And is there anything else new on the —
MR. CROWLEY: I have not heard what President Zelaya is – has any travel plans to the United States. I wouldn’t rule it out. We obviously have taken stock of the recent OAS delegation in his trip to Honduras. We’re very mindful of the judgment that at least has been set up to this point by the de facto regime, but they have no plans to agree to the San Jose Accords. We still think that that is the right process to help to resolve this situation. And we are evaluating our options based on the activity this week. And I think we’ll make some decisions in the next couple of days.
QUESTION: I’m sorry. Decisions on further sanctions?
MR. CROWLEY: On further steps. Obviously, the position that the de facto regime has taken, you’ve already seen that it’s having consequences, not just in actions that the United States has made, actions that others in the region have made or are beginning to make. But we are very – we’ll obviously watch very closely this week. The OAS delegation went there this week, made what we thought was a very direct offer and a treaty to Honduras, to the de facto regime, that they should sign on to the San Jose Accords. They’ve made it categorical that they have…as far as their position today is, they have no plans to do that. And we are now evaluating, based on what we have heard since the delegation has come back to the OAS, and we’re consulting within the OAS. We’re taking that – stock of that, and we’ll make some decisions here very soon.
QUESTION: P.J., on the same subject?
MR. CROWLEY: Yeah.
QUESTION: Would these additional actions be just by the United States or collectively with some other countries?
MR. CROWLEY: Well, I’m sure – obviously, what Honduras has done has obviously already had consequences, including their suspension from the OAS, and there are implications from that. But I would say that probably collectively, I think the Central American Bank for Economic Integration has frozen credit as a result of the current situation. The United States has suspended its visa processing as a result of what’s happened. And we obviously have our other steps that we can take and there are consequences from that – those steps. But given the de facto regime’s refusal this week to meet the demands of the OAS delegation, we will make some judgments based on that, and we’ll announce them very shortly.