Ousted Honduran leader urges region to reject vote

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Deposed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya sent a letter to divided Latin American leaders Tuesday urging them to reject elections held under the coup-installed government and help restore him to power.

"I ask you not to recognize the electoral fraud and for your cooperation so that this coup d'etat does not remain unpunished," the leftist leader said in a letter released from the Brazilian Embassy, where he is holed up under threat of arrest.

Western Hemisphere countries united to condemn Zelaya's June 28 ouster but are divided on whether to recognize Sunday's presidential vote.

The United States, which cut off development aid and anti-drug trafficking cooperation with its impoverished ally after the coup, says Hondurans have the right to choose a new leader regular elections that had been scheduled before the putsch. Costa Rica, Peru, Colombia and Panama share that stance.

But Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela and other left-led governments say recognizing the election amounts to legitimizing Central America's first coup in 20 years.

Porfirio Lobo, a wealthy rancher from the opposition National Party, overwhelmingly defeated Elvin Santos of the ruling Liberal Party, which largely turned against Zelaya and supported his ouster. Zelaya, whose single, four-year term ends Jan. 27, was not a candidate.

Lobo and interim President Roberto Micheletti say a large turnout Sunday showed a majority of Hondurans supported the vote and want to put the crisis behind them. Electoral officials say more than 60 percent of registered voters cast ballots.

But Zelaya, who had urged a boycott, insisted Tuesday that 60 percent of voters stayed home.

At least one independent monitoring group also reported a turnout rate much lower than the official one. Hagamos Democracia, the local partner of the U.S. National Democratic Institute, said its count of 1,000 polling stations put turnout at about 48 percent. They said the count had a margin of error of 1.8 percent.

NDI, a U.S. government-funded group that promotes democracy around the world, also sent monitors to Honduras but has not released its own assessment.

NDI president Ken Wollack said he could not comment on the official turnout rate but noted that Hagamos Democracia's count had a low margin of error and successfully projected the vote's outcome: 56 percent for Lobo and 38 percent for Santos.

However, he also said a 48 percent turnout would be consistent with a trend of increasing abstention in Honduras. Turnout was 55 percent in the 2005 election that brought Zelaya to office, 10 percentage points lower than in the previous election.

"In terms of the conduct of the election itself, I think there is a sense that it was a generally, with some exceptions, a peaceful and orderly process," Wollack told The Associated Press.

However, he said campaigning was complicated by curfews, the periodic closures of opposition-aligned media and the arrest of Zelaya supporters.

Marco Aurelio Garcia, foreign adviser to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, told reporters Monday night that the elections appeared to show strong "popular participation, and we can't be indifferent to that political fact," Brazil's O Globo newspaper reported Tuesday.

But at a summit in Portugal, Silva maintained Brazil's position against recognizing the election.

"We can't pretend nothing happened," Silva said Tuesday before leaving the gathering of leaders from Latin America, Spain and Portugal. "If this state of affairs is allowed to remain, democracy will be at serious risk in Latin and Central America."

Summit participants demanded Zelaya be restored to finish his term, but could not agree on whether to recognize Lobo's incoming government.

The United States is also urging Zelaya's return to power and hopes the two sides will return to the negotiating table before his term ends.

Under a U.S.-brokered pact, Congress must vote on whether Zelaya should be restored to power as head of a unity government. Lawmakers are scheduled to begin that debate Wednesday.

However, Zelaya's chances of returning to office look increasingly slim. In an interview with AP on Sunday, Zelaya said he would not return to the presidency even if Congress votes him back in.

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