Washington has revoked the visas of Honduras’ interim president and 17 other top officials to pressure the Central American nation to reinstate ousted leader Manuel Zelaya, Honduras’ government said on Saturday.
The interim government expects the US to revoke the visas of at least 1,000 more public officials “in the coming days,” Information Minister Rene Zepeda said.
Interim Honduran President Roberto Micheletti said losing his diplomatic and tourist visas would not weaken his rejection of the return of Zelaya, who was toppled in a June 28 military-backed coup and flown into exile.
Micheletti said he was expecting the action and called it “a sign of the pressure that the US government is exerting on our country.”
The move “changes nothing, because I am not willing to take back what has happened in Honduras,” he said on Radio station HRN.
Washington on Friday revoked the diplomatic and tourist visas for 14 Supreme Court judges, the armed forces chief, the foreign relations secretary and Honduras’ attorney general, Micheletti spokeswoman Marcia de Villeda said on Saturday.
US State Department spokesman Darby Holladay said later on Saturday that he could not comment.
“By law we are not allowed to comment on the revocation of visas,” he said.
There was no immediate reaction from Zelaya in Nicaragua.
Last week, Washington cut off millions of dollars in aid to the Honduran government in response to Micheletti’s refusal to accept a mediated accord that called for returning Zelaya to power with limited authority until elections set for November.
The accord was brokered by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, who won the 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in helping end Central America’s civil wars.
Washington recently revoked the US visas of some of Micheletti’s Honduran allies and supporters. The US also has stopped issuing most visas at its embassy in Tegucigalpa.
“I’m OK because I expected the decision and I accept it with dignity ... and without the least bit of resentment or anger at the United States because it is that country’s right,” Micheletti said.
However, he complained that the letter he received from the State Department addressed him as president of Congress, his position prior to Zelaya’s ouster, and not president of Honduras.
“It doesn’t even say ‘Mr President of the Republic’ or anything,” he said.
Micheletti reiterated that “the United States has always been a friend of Honduras and will continue being one forever, in spite of the actions it has taken.”
The eliminated US aid includes more than US$31 million in non-humanitarian assistance to Honduras, including US$11 million remaining in a more than a US$200 million, five-year assistance program run by the Millennium Challenge Corp.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS