2009 Honduran coup d'état

President Zelaya was promoting a controversial nonbinding poll on whether to include a referendum in the form of a fourth ballot box in the November elections on convening a constitutional convention to write a new constitution to give future Presidents the option of more terms in office. He had ignored a restraining order in this regard. Some claim his goal in doing so was to extend his term. But as the scheduled balloting would have been simultaneous with the election of his successor, his term would have ended long before any possible constitutional changes. Executive decrees and their legal consequences The ballot was scheduled for June 28, 2009. On May 27, 2009, the Administrative Litigation Court annulled the Executive decree PCM-05-2009 that enabled the ballot. In response the Executive accepted the ruling, but issued decree PCM-019-2009, identical to the previous decree, but substituting "consultation" with "public opinion survey". On May 30, the same Court clarified that the scope of the previous ruling covered any decree that attempted to conduct the proposed ballot - howsoever worded or published. This clarification annulled PCM-019-2009 as well. Zelaya then issued a new executive decree PCM-020-2009 (La Gaceta article number 31945) to replace decrees PCM-05-2009 and PCM-019-2009. The new decree called for a "Public Opinion Survey Convening a Constitutional Assembly" and referred to it as "an official activity of the Government of the Republic of Honduras". According to a legal analysis by former Supreme Court President Vilma Morales, Zelaya automatically ceased being President of Honduras with the publication of decree PCM-020-2009 and thus no coup d'état existed. However, PCM-027-2009 was never processed by the Honduran courts. This new decree, published in La Gaceta on 26 June 2009, further explained the purpose, form, and objectives of the opinion poll to be carried out by the National Institute of Statistics. Despite this, the courts had already made up their minds about any attempts related to this issue. Zelaya's lawyers were also denied the possibility to participate in the process. PCM-027-2009 was sheltered in article 5 of the "Law of Citizen Participation" and articles 2 and 5 of the Honduran Constitution. Zelaya defined his actions as a non-binding opinion poll, but his political opponents portrayed his actions as a binding referendum aimed at reforming articles in the Honduran Constitution regarding forms of government and re-election. Attorney General's office acts On 27 May 2009, the Administrative Law Tribunal issued an injunction against holding the referendum at the request of the Honduran Attorney General Luis Alberto Rubi. On 16 June, the Court of Appeals unanimously upheld the 27 May injunction. On 18 June, the Administrative Law Tribunal ordered Zelaya to comply with the ruling. The Attorney General's office filed charges against Zelaya on 25 June. Supreme Court issues arrest and search warrants On 26 June, the Honduran Supreme Court unanimously found that the Presidency had not complied with 16 June court order. It also found he was answerable to charges for crimes against the form of government, treason to the motherland, abuse of office and usurpation of functions that damaged the administration. It appointed Supreme Court Justice Tomás Arita Valle to try the case. On 26 June, the Supreme Court issued a sealed (secret) arrest warrant for President Zelaya, signed by Justice Tomás Arita Valle. The interim government confirmed that the Supreme Court of Justice unanimously voted to appoint Tomás Arita Valle to hear the process in its preparatory and intermediate phases; and that he lawfully issued an arrest and raid warrant. Some Zelaya supporters have sought to cast doubt on the Supreme Court's documentation. Jari Dixon Herrera Hernández, a lawyer with the Attorney General's office, said the order to arrest Zelaya came a day after the coup. ==Zelaya's detention and exile==

Soldiers stormed the president's residence in Tegucigalpa early in the morning of 28 June, disarming the presidential guard, waking Zelaya and putting him on a plane to Costa Rica. Colonel Bayardo said, "It was a fast operation. It was over in minutes, and there were no injuries, no deaths. We said, 'Sir, we have a judicial order to detain you.' " Within hours, Zelaya spoke to media in San José, calling the events "a coup" and "a kidnapping". He said that soldiers pulled him from his bed and assaulted his guards. Zelaya stated that he would not recognise anyone named as his successor, that he would be meeting with diplomats and that he wanted to finish his term in office. Television and radio stations broadcast no news. Later that day, the Supreme Court issued a statement that it had ordered the army to remove Zelaya from office. The Supreme Court stated "The armed forces, in charge of supporting the constitution, acted to defend the state of law and have been forced to apply legal dispositions against those who have expressed themselves publicly and acted against the dispositions of the basic law". On 30 June, the military's chief lawyer, Colonel Herberth Bayardo Inestroza Membreño, showed a detention order, signed 26 June by a Supreme Court judge, which ordered the armed forces to detain the president, identified by his full name of José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, at his home in the Tres Caminos area of the capital. It cited him for treason and abuse of authority, among other charges. Colonel Inestroza later stated that deporting Zelaya did not comply with the court order: "In the moment that we took him out of the country, in the way that he was taken out, there is a crime. Because of the circumstances of the moment this crime occurred, there is going to be a justification and cause for acquittal that will protect us." He said the decision was taken by the military leadership "in order to avoid bloodshed". He said "What was more beneficial, remove this gentleman from Honduras or present him to prosecutors and have a mob assault and burn and destroy and for us to have to shoot?" Colonel Inestroza also commented that Zelaya's allegiance to Hugo Chávez was hard to stomach and "It would be difficult for us, with our training, to have a relationship with a leftist government. That's impossible. I personally would have retired, because my thinking, my principles, would not have allowed me to participate in that." On 17 August 2009, President Micheletti also said that putting Zelaya on a plane to Costa Rica instead of holding him for trial had been a mistake: "It wasn't correct. We have to punish whoever allowed that to happen. The rest was framed within what the constitution requires." ==Congress removes Zelaya from office==

The National Congress the following morning voted to accept Zelaya's resignation letter, dated 25 June, – appointed the President of the National Congress Roberto Micheletti, a member of Zelaya's party, to succeed Zelaya. Some felt that the president had changed his politics during his administration, from right to left, which earned him the antipathy of his party. The Honduran National Congress unanimously agreed to: • Under the Articles 1, 2,3,4, 205, 220, subsections 20, 218, 242, 321, 322, 323 of the Constitution of the Republic, • Disapprove Zelaya's repeated violations of the constitution, laws and court orders. • Remove Zelaya from office. • Name the current President of Congress Roberto Micheletti to complete the constitutional period that ends on 27 January 2010. ==Legality of ouster==

Many governments, media, and human-rights organisations outside Honduras have termed the ouster a coup. The United Nations, the Organization of American States (OAS), and the European Union condemned the removal of Zelaya as a military coup. On 5 July 2009, the Organization of American States OAS, invoking for the first time Article 21 of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, voted by acclamation of all member states to suspend Honduras from the organisation. Soon after the coup, U.S. President Barack Obama stated: "We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras, the democratically elected president there." He stated: "It would be a terrible precedent if we start moving backwards into the era in which we are seeing military coups as a means of political transition, rather than democratic elections." Cutting off aid was seen as a possibility in the days after the coup, Clinton did not do so, and the U.S. never formally declared that a coup had occurred. By November, the U.S. "focused on pushing for elections" in the country. In September 2009, the Board of the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation, headed by Clinton, cut off $11 million in aid to the Honduran government in the wake of the coup, and suspended another $4 million in planned contributions to a road project. From 2009 to mid-2016, however, the U.S. provided about $200 million in military and police aid to Honduras, a controversial decision given the violence in Honduras and the government's human rights violations. Arguments that Zelaya's removal was illegal have been advanced by several lawyers. The Supreme Court never ruled on any of the charges filed by the public prosecutor on 26 June. The arrest warrant was issued for the purposes of taking a deposition from him. According to Edmundo Orellana, the events were constitutionally irregular for several reasons: because Zelaya was captured by the armed forces, not the national police (Art. 273, 292); and because the Congress, not the courts, judged Zelaya to have broken the law (Arts. 303 and 304). Orellana concluded, "Violations of the Constitution cannot be put right with another violation. The Constitution is defended by subjecting oneself to it. Their violation translates into disregard for the State of Law and infringes on the very essence of the Law. Therefore, a coup d'Etat never has been and should never be the solution to a political conflict." Other civic and business leaders, even those opposed to Zelaya's referendum efforts, agreed that Zelaya was deprived of due process in his ouster. Still, many people in Honduras, including most of the country's official institutions, claimed that there was a constitutional succession of power. In a statement to a subcommittee of the US House Committee on International Affairs, former Honduran Supreme Court Justice, Foreign Affairs minister, and law professor Guillermo Pérez Cadalso said that all major governmental institutions agreed that Zelaya was violating the law. Supreme Court Justice Rosalinda Cruz said that, as a sovereign and independent nation, Honduras had the right to freely decide to remove a president who was violating Honduran laws. She added: "Unfortunately, our voice hasn't been heard." She compared Zelaya's tactics, including his dismissal of the armed forces chief for obeying a court order to impound ballots to be used in the vote, with those of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez: "Some say it was not Zelaya but Chávez governing." Micheletti said forcing deposed President Manuel Zelaya to leave the country, instead of arresting him, was a mistake. According to an opinion of an employee of the US Law Library of Congress which was published September 2009 in Forbes, the military's decision to send Zelaya into exile was illegal, but the judicial and legislative branches applied constitutional and statutory law in accordance with the Honduran legal system. This conclusion was disputed by lawmakers, Honduran constitutional law experts, and government officials, who requested that the LLoC report be retracted. Independence of judiciary A lack of an independent, professional judiciary was a factor in the inability of the Honduran government to process Zelaya through a political or criminal trial. The Honduran judiciary remains deeply politicised, with the highest judicial offices still being distributed between the two main parties. Requiring judges to stand for re-election makes them subject to the policies of their sponsoring party. Eight of the judges were selected by the Liberal Party and seven by the National Party. According to a report by Heather Berkman of the University of California. the politicisation of the justice system, including the Supreme Court, the Ministry of Public Security and the Public Ministry, inhibits the due process of law. José Antonio Gutiérrez Navas, in 1998, spoke at the UN General Assembly, representing the Liberal Party government of Carlos Roberto Flores, at a session to commemorate fifty years of human rights. Oscar Fernando Chinchilla Banegas and Gustavo Enrique Bustillo Palma were National Party alternate members of Congress (2002–2006). The US State Department noted in 2004 that the judiciary and Attorney General's office is subject to corruption and political influence. ==Demonstrations surrounding Zelaya's removal==

In response to the events, a series of demonstrations took place, with some opposing the coup and others supporting it. Several notable demonstrations are listed below: • On 28 June, in the capital city of Tegucigalpa, hundreds of demonstrators opposing the coup erected roadblocks. • On 29 June, approximately 2,000 anti-coup demonstrators spent the day in the main square of the city. • On 30 June, demonstrations in favor of the removal of Zelaya were held. During an emotional speech, Armeda López stated, "Chávez ate Venezuela first, then Bolivia, but that didn't happen in Honduras. We will not allow anyone to rule us here." Protest signs included messages such as "Enough of illegality" and "I love my constitution." • On 1 July, in the morning, supporters of the coup dressed in white emerged in Tegucigalpa, chanting slogans such as "Mel out, Mel out!" and "Democracy yes, dictatorship no!" The religious sector, women's organizations, politicians, and government officials delivered speeches in support of Zelaya's removal. Jorge Yllescas Olive expressed, "Hondurans have saved our country. Justice is on our side, and we are demonstrating it to the world." Demonstrators also expressed their opposition to Hugo Chávez's threats against Honduras. • On 3 July, approximately 70,000 people demonstrated in favor of the new government and against Zelaya. • On 30 July, several thousand individuals marched in El Durazno, Tegucigalpa, to protest against the coup. According to Amnesty International, these protesters were violently dispersed by the police. • On 22 September, several hundred anti-coup protesters gathered outside the Brazilian embassy, where Zelaya had sought refuge. However, they were dispersed by the police. Government opponents argue that the pro-coup demonstrations were allegedly orchestrated and financed by the government, citing supporting evidence in certain instances. According to these claims, pro-coup protesters were allegedly transported by buses from various parts of the country to the capital city of Tegucigalpa. Conversely, similar buses carrying anti-coup demonstrators from rural areas were purportedly denied entry into the city. ==Human rights abuses of the interim government==

De facto President Roberto Micheletti ordered a curfew which initially lasted for the 48 hours from Sunday night (28 June) and to Tuesday (30 June) and has continued since then in an arbitrary way. According to Amnesty International and the International Observation Mission for the Human Rights Situation in Honduras, the curfew law was not published in the official journal La Gaceta and was not approved by Congress. That curfew was later revised to be in effect from 10 pm to 5 am, was extended twice, ended on 7 July, and was restarted again on 15 July. Amnesty International and the International Observation Mission stated that curfew implementation was arbitrary, with curfew times announced on radio stations, changing randomly each day and between different regions of Honduras. The "state of exception" declared on 1 July is equivalent to a state of siege. It suspended civil liberties including freedom of transit and due process, as well as permitting search and seizure without a warrant. The ambassadors of Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua on 29 June were detained and beaten by Honduran troops before being released. Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez stated that the Venezuelan ambassador was assaulted by Honduran soldiers and left by the side of a road. Allies of Zelaya, among them several government officials, were taken into custody by the military. Foreign Minister Patricia Rodas and the mayor of the city San Pedro Sula, Rodolfo Padilla Sunseri, were detained at military bases. According to the Venezuelan government's ABN news service, Tomás Andino Mencías, a member of the party, reported that PUD lawmakers were led away by the military when they tried to enter the parliament building for 28 June vote on Zelaya's deposal. A dozen former ministers from the Zelaya government went into hiding, some in foreign embassies, fearing arrest. Local media reported that at least eight ministers besides Rodas had been detained. Hugo Chávez and Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez separately claimed that Honduran Foreign Minister Patricia Rodas was detained by the military. Rodríguez said that the Cuban, Venezuelan and Nicaraguan ambassadors to Honduras had tried but were unable to protect Rodas from a group of masked soldiers who forcibly took her from their grasp.{{Cite news ==Media restrictions==

Reuters on 29 June 2009, describing the situation in Honduras as a "media blackout", reported that the military had shut down several TV stations, radio stations, and newspapers' websites. Among the TV stations closed were CNN en Español, TeleSUR, and "a pro-Zelaya channel". Reuters said that "the few television and radio stations still operating on Monday [the 29th] played tropical music or aired soap operas and cooking shows", and "made little reference to the demonstrations or international condemnation of the coup". A government health worker interviewed by Reuters said that the anti-Zelaya newspapers El Heraldo and La Tribuna, and "some television channels controlled by the opposition" were the only ones still broadcasting on the morning of the 29th. On 29 June, soldiers shut down Channel 8, a pro-Zelaya government station. According to a press release published on the website of Radio Globo Honduras, which had long sided with Zelaya, a group of 60 soldiers took the radio off the air and the employees, including Alejandro Villatoro, were allegedly threatened and intimidated. The station was allowed to resume transmission, but staff had to follow some rules which they believed limited freedom of expression. The website of the radio was down but was re-established. Alejandro Villatoro said he was arrested and kidnapped by military forces. On or just before 4 August 2009, the National Telecommunications Commission (CONATEL) terminated Radio Globo's transmission frequency rights. Honduran newspaper La Prensa reported on 30 June that an armed group of Zelaya supporters attacked its main headquarters by throwing stones and other objects at their windows, until police intervened. According to the paper, it was discovered that the group was led by Venezuelan and Nicaraguan nationals. The Paris-based press freedom group Reporters Without Borders released a statement on 29 June stating that, "The suspension or closure of local and international broadcast media indicates that the coup leaders want to hide what is happening". Carlos Lauría of the New York–based Committee to Protect Journalists said: "The de facto government clearly used the security forces to restrict the news... Hondurans did not know what was going on. They clearly acted to create an information vacuum to keep people unaware of what was actually happening". However, in an interview published on 9 July 2009 in The Washington Post, Ramón Custodio López, Honduras's human rights ombudsman, said he had received no official complaints from journalists: "This is the first I have heard about an occupation or military raid of a station", he said. "I try to do the best job I can, but there are things that escape my knowledge". ==Aftermath==

There were demonstrations supporting and opposing Zelaya's removal from power. The Zelaya administration was investigated and prosecuted in the absence of Zelaya. Some organisations reported human rights violations and media restrictions. Zelaya made two open attempts to return to the country, which were rebuffed; he eventually returned clandestinely and sought asylum in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa. Negotiations between the coup government and those seeking Zelaya's restitution continued a rocky path; although both sides signed the San José-Tegucigalpa-Guaymuras Accord both had differing interpretations as to the implications for Zelaya's restitution. Some Hondurans hoped to move past the coup through the elections of 29 November 2009. The interim government of Honduras hired the Washington DC–based lobbying firm Chlopak, Leonard, Schechter and Associates to improve opinions of policymakers, especially in the US Congress. The firm had represented other governments like Brazil, Colombia, Nicaragua, Georgia, and Serbia. President Obama imposed sanctions against the de facto government for not reinstating Zelaya, despite his ties to Hugo Chavez. Chlopak, Leonard, Schechter and Associates leveraged contacts in Congress, including Sen. Jim DeMint, who opposed sanctions on the new Honduran government. In June 2019, Zelaya presented in Tegucigalpa a book describing his ouster entitled "El Golpe 28J". In May 2011, after more than one and a half years in exile in the Dominican Republic, Zelaya was allowed to return to Honduras. Following his return on 28 May, the Organization of American States was to vote on readmitting Honduras to its body. In July 2011, Honduras's Truth Commission concluded that Zelaya broke the law when he disregarded the Supreme Court ruling ordering him to cancel the referendum, but that his removal from office was deemed illegal and a coup. The commission also ruled that the designation of Roberto Micheletti as interim president by Congress was unconstitutional, and his administration was characterized as a "de facto regime." , the coup had weakened democratic institutions such, that along with corruption and police impunity, state security forces persecuted coup opponents, peasants, indigenous protesters and others, and the crime rate increased massively. In this context more than 13,000 Honduran children crossed U.S. borders from October 2013 until May 2014, a 1272% increase compared to 2009. That same year, Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Carl Levin asked the U.S. Defense Department Office of the Inspector General to investigate charges that the William Perry Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies, the educational arm of U.S. Southern Command located at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., had actively promoted the coup declared illegal by President Obama but remained unpunished. Following the coup, trends of decreasing poverty were reversed. The nation saw a poverty increase of 13.2 percent and in extreme poverty of 26.3 percent in just 3 years. Furthermore, unemployment grew between 2008 and 2012 from 6.8 percent to 14.1 percent. However, by this point in time, the Zelayas were no longer members of the Liberal Party of Honduras and had since formed a separate party called the Liberty and Refoundation party, or LIBRE. ==Documents on US role==

The US Congressional Research Service, a non-partisan congressional committee, found the interpretation and application of the Honduran constitution that led to the removal of Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales to be legal. Emails released later show that the 2009 removal was supported by Hillary Clinton's State Department by not recognizing it as coup in order to maintain U.S. aid to the Honduran people. Clinton and her team worked behind the scenes to stall military and economic efforts by neighboring countries through the Organization of American States to restore Manuel Zelaya to office. "The OAS meeting today turned into a non-event — just as we hoped," wrote one senior State Department official, celebrating their success in defusing what they judged would have been a violent or destabilizing restoration. Secretary Clinton helped organize elections where Zelaya would be excluded. In her own words, she "strategized on a plan to restore order in Honduras and ensure that free and fair elections could be held quickly and legitimately, which would render the question of Zelaya moot". ==See also==