Guitierrez offered exile
2005-04-24 08:23
Quito - A diplomatic standoff over ex-Ecuadoran leader Lucio Gutierrez inched closer to resolution early on Sunday, following word from Brazil the ousted president will be flown out of the country later in the day.
"If everything goes according to plan, former president Gutierrez will arrive in Brazil tomorrow," a foreign ministry official told AFP in Brasilia late on Saturday. "Brazil is taking all necessary measure to make it possible."
A Brazilian air force plane was expected to take off in the next few hours from Porto Velho and head for the Ecuadoran capital to pick up the former president, who has been granted asylum in Brazil following his ouster last Wednesday amid popular unrest.
Officials said the plane had been granted authorisation to land, despite requests by Ecuadoran protesters that Gutierrez, who has been holed up at the Brazilian Embassy here since his removal, be handed over to new Ecuadoran authorities.
Ecuadoran interior minister Mauricio Gandara said safe passage for Gutierrez "cannot be denied", but specific arrangements will be kept confidential for security reasons.
Gutierrez, meanwhile, told local television he had been removed from office "unconstitutionally and without political trial, and without having committed dereliction of duty.
"I am not a thief. I have not stolen. To the contrary, I was collecting the debts from the thieves," he said by telephone from the Brazilian ambassador's residence in his first statement since being toppled on Wednesday by a vote of Ecuador's Congress.
Gutierrez's vice president, Alfredo Palacio, named president by Congress, was still governing without international recognition. The OAS has voted to send a mission here as soon as possible to look into Gutierrez's ouster and withheld its recognition for now.
The United States said it was ready to work with new authorities in Ecuador but also declined to explicitly say it recognised the new government. Quito has not said whether any nation has recognised the change in leadership.
'Coward'
Former vice-president Blasco Penaherrera, sent by Quito to Washington to explain Gutierrez's removal to the OAS, said from the US capital that Ecuador must allow the deposed leader to go into exile in Brazil.
But Attorney General Cecilia Armas has called for the deposed president's arrest for ordering police to forcibly disperse demonstrations this week in which two people were killed and scores were injured.
Demonstrators, who are seen in front of the residence day and night, have shouted "coward" and called for charges against the deposed president. Some have hoisted signs demanding "Prison for Gutierrez" and chanted: "Brazil, Don't Betray Ecuador."
Congress ousted the leftist Gutierrez after months of protests over his December dismissal of 27 of 31 Supreme Court justices.