Honduras: Another Government Is Missing

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Taking over as one-man ruler was Colonel Osvaldo López, 42, the armed forces chief who masterminded the revolt. With the sureness of past experience—he had led another coup in 1956 —López cut off communication to the countryside, imposed martial law and canceled the Oct. 13 presidential election. Ex-President Villeda Morales and ex-Presidential Candidate Rodas Alvarado were packed aboard an air force C-47 and flown to exile in Costa Rica. The Honduran army then went about mopping up loyalist resistance. At week's end, just as the new regime was being sworn in, fighting broke out again in the streets of Tegucigalpa. A downtown hotel was set afire, and university students took potshots at patrolling soldiers. There was still no end to the bloodshed in the coup that had already cost more than 100 lives.

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