Washington, July 25: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called efforts by ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya to return to his homeland “reckless”.
Zelaya briefly crossed into Honduras on Friday and then stepped back into Nicaragua to avoid arrest, almost a month after soldiers sent him into exile.
Clinton called the move “reckless”, adding that it would not help restore democratic and constitutional order in the Honduras crisis.
She also stressed the Obama administration’s support for the proposal put forth by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, which included an 11-point plan to reinstate Zelaya and offered amnesty for the coup leaders.
Zelaya however said he was forced to act on his own, after US-backed talks failed to reach an agreement with the coup-installed government to reinstate him.
The interim government has vowed to arrest him if he tries to return.
Earlier in the day, security forces fired tear gas at dozens of pro-Zelaya supporters trying to reach the border to greet the president near the coffee town of El Paraiso.
Several people have reportedly been wounded in the clashes.
According to a Press TV report, the Honduran Army has also imposed a curfew on the entire district near the Nicaraguan border crossing.
Meanwhile Mark Weisbort from the center for economic and policy research in Washington told Press TV that Human Rights groups in Honduras are worried that the interim government is going back to a dictatorship policy of selective assassination like in the 1980’s.
Some regional leaders believe that the US — despite condemning the incident — was actually behind the June 28 military coup against Zelaya in a bid to threaten the new alliance by socialist heads of state in Latin America.
—-Agencies