It looks like Honduras has won its four month standoff against its Chavez-supported deposed president Manuel Zelaya and the US State Department. An agreement has been reached that in exchange for letting Zelaya petition the Honduran Supreme Court and Congress for reinstatement, the US will lift the sanctions it imposed on one of Latin America’s poorest countries and will recognize the November elections for a new president. Zelaya is unlikely to be reinstated by the Honduran Supreme Court and Congress who expelled him in the first place when he tried to hold an illegal referendum on changing the Honduran constitution to allow him to run for re-election. It is nice to see the good guys winning against the US State Department and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Still the Hondurans will have to exercise caution during the next few weeks writes Otto Reich, a former assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere:
The bigger danger is Chavez, who is not constrained by scruples, decency or financial limits. Chavez will try to put his ally Zelaya back into office, even for a few weeks prior to the transfer of power, and preferably before the presidential election in November, so as to intimidate the opposition and claim a victory of sorts. The U.S. must do al it can to prevent the Venezuelans and their enforcers the Cubans from interfering.
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