The drama centered on the president's bid to secure a second term, becoming the latest in a long list of Latin American leaders, including Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, to seek constitutional changes to expand presidential powers and ease term limits.

Leftist leaders were especially vocal in their backing of the Zelaya, who was elected as a conservative in 2006 before making a dramatic shift to the left.

Chavez threatened military action if his ambassador or embassy in Honduras is harmed, saying he would launch a continental battle to see Zelaya restored to the presidency, hours after the Honduran leader was ousted and flown to Costa Rica.

The "military junta" in Honduras "would be entering a de facto state of war" should they harm his ambassador in Tegucigalpa, warned the firebrand leftist leader.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez denounced the "brutal and criminal coup d'etat" in Honduras and demanded the return of Zelaya, the "sole legitimate president" of Honduras, whose Congress voted in its speaker Roberto Micheletti to take over until the presidential term ends in January.

Chavez, a thorn in Washington's side in Latin America, denounced the arrest of Zelaya, suggesting the United States was implicated.

Speaking in Caracas, Chavez urged Obama to speak out against Zelaya's arrest, saying "the Yankee empire has a lot to do" with developments in Honduras.

The United States has had a battered image in Central and South America, where it supported several coups and military governments during the Cold War in a bid to contain the grip of communism over its southern neighbors.

But in his last interview before his arrest, Zelaya told Spain's El Pais that a first planned attempt to remove him from power Friday had been thwarted after the United States declined to back the move.

"I'm only still here in office thanks to the United States not supporting a coup," he said.

Argentine President Cristina Kirchner, speaking after voting in legislative elections in Argentina, said she was "extremely concerned" about the situation in Honduras, calling the military's removal of Zelaya a sign that "we are back to the worst barbarism in Latin American history."

Brazil's foreign ministry warned that "military acts of this type constitute a violation of democracy and are not in line with the political development of the region."

Saying "the time for dictatorships is over," Bolivia's Socialist President Evo Morales called on "international organizations, social movements and presidents to condemn and reject the military coup d'etat in Honduras."

Member countries of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), an anti-trade liberalization bloc of which Honduras has adhered, also denounced the "coup d'etat."

An emergency ALBA meeting was called Sunday, Chavez said. The Organization of American States (OAS) also held a meeting at its headquarters in Washington.

The OAS Permanent Council was working on a consensus resolution "that will condemn the efforts to depose President Zelaya of Honduras, calling for his return to Honduras and for a full restoration of democratic order," a US administration official said.

Quito meanwhile called for a presidential-level meeting of the Rio Group, an organization of 23 Latin American and Caribbean states, without indicating the place or time of such talks.

Zelaya's removal "violates the most basic norms of democracy and international law," Ecuador's foreign ministry said in a statement, calling for the "immediate restoration" of the Honduran president to power.

The Rio Group in turn expressed its "strongest condemnation" over the developments in Honduras, denouncing as "illegitimate" Zelaya's removal from power.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega urged his peers to hold emergency talks of the System for Central American Integration (SICA), voicing hope to reverse Zelaya's ouster, which he called "a terrorist act against the institution" of democracy in Latin America.

Honduras neighbor El Salvador stepped up military presence at its international airport and the border between the two countries to prepare for the possible evacuation of Salvadorans living in Honduras.

Colombia's foreign ministry expressed "deep dismay over the breakdown of the constitutional order," adding that it rejected Zelaya's "removal from power by force."

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