Demonstrators protest at the gate of the presidential palace in Tegucigalpa. Soldiers seized Honduras' national palace and sent Honduras' President Manuel Zelaya into exile in Costa Rica on Sunday, hours before a disputed constitutional referendum. -- PHOTO: AP
TEGUCIGALPA - GUNSHOTS were heard near the presidential palace in Honduras late on Sunday as protests erupted after the country's army ousted and exiled leftist President Manuel Zelaya in Central America's first military coup since the Cold War.
Zeyala loved outdoors, horses
BORN September 20, 1952, Mr Zelaya's father was a cattle ranch owner in Olancho, and Mr Zelaya has retained his love of the rural outdoors and of horses as well.
He was head of the Honduras wood industries association and director of the Honduran Private Enterprise Council. He also ran a bank and other businesses.
WASHINGTON - THE United States led a chorus of condemnation on Sunday as Honduran troops backed by parliament ousted President Manuel Zelaya, with many countries demanding his swift reinstatement.
'We recognise Zelaya as the duly elected and constitutional president of Honduras. We see no other,' a US State Department official told reporters on condition of anonymity.
TEGUCIGALPA - THE newly-appointed leader of Honduras Roberto Micheletti ordered a 48-hour curfew starting late on Sunday, after denying there had been a coup d'etat on deposed President Manuel Zelaya.
'A curfew begins today and ends on Tuesday,' Mr Micheletti said at his first press conference since being appointed by Congress to replace Mr Zelaya.
Hundreds of pro-Zelaya protesters, some of them masked and wielding sticks, set up barricades in the center of the capital, Tegucigalpa, and sealed off road access to the presidential palace.
A Reuters witness said several shots were heard outside the presidential palace and an ambulance was seen arriving at the scene. It was not clear if anyone was injured or who fired the shots.
Mr Zelaya, in office since 2006, was ousted in a dawn coup after he upset the judiciary, Congress and the army by seeking constitutional changes that would allow presidents to seek re-election beyond a four-year term.
Congress named an interim president, Roberto Micheletti, who announced a curfew for Sunday and Monday nights. The country's top court said it had told the army to remove Mr Zelaya.
The coup was strongly condemned by Zelaya's regional ally Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez - who has long championed the left in Latin America. Chavez put his military on alert in case Honduran troops moved against his embassy or envoy there.
US President Barack Obama's administration, the European Union and a string of other foreign governments also voiced backing for Zelaya, who was snatched by troops from his residence and whisked away by plane to Costa Rica.
The Organisation of American States demanded Mr Zelaya's immediate and unconditional return.
Honduras, an impoverished coffee, textile and banana exporter with a population of 7 million, had been politically stable since the end of military rule in the early 1980s. But Mr Zelaya has moved the country further left since taking power and struck up a close alliance with Chavez, upsetting the army and the traditionally conservative rich elite.
Mr Zelaya tried to fire the armed forces chief, General Romeo Vasquez, last week in a dispute over the president's attempt to hold an unofficial referendum on Sunday about changing the constitution to allow presidential terms beyond a single, four-year term. Under the constitution as it stands, Mr Zelaya would have been due to leave office in early 2010. -- REUTERS
