Zelaya men under house arrest

HONDURAS: 49 Honduran peasants were sentenced to house arrest for their sit-in protest against the June 28 coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya.

The peasants, who were to protest for 90 days in a public building, were evicted by police from the National Agrarian Agency last week and sent to jail.

According to the sentence, they will have to report regularly to the authorities instead of serving jail terms and will be unable to leave the country.

Luis Echeverria, prosecutor of common crimes in Honduras’ public ministry, who named the peasants’ action as sedition, told media that Judge Laura Casco had made the ruling.

The peasants will have an opportunity to appeal within 20 days, he added.

The decision came as representatives of Zelaya, who lost power in a June 28 coup, and that of Roberto Micheletti, who became president following the coup, met in a hotel in Honduras’ capital, Tegucigalpa for talks brokered by the Organization of American States. Tegucigalpa, Thursday, Xinhua