WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was to meet here Tuesday with Honduran leader Manuel Zelaya, in his highest level talks with the Obama administration since being ousted in an army-backed coup.

The State Department said the meeting was scheduled for 1:00 pm (1700 GMT) at Clinton's offices in the State Department building in Washington, but no media access is being granted.

During a visit to Nicaragua on Monday, Zelaya said he would travel later in the evening to Washington for talks with Clinton.

Zelaya met last week with Tom Shannon, the assistant secretary of state for western hemisphere affairs, on the sidelines of an Organization of American States (OAS) talks in Washington, US officials said.

He did not meet either with Clinton, who was working at home that day to recover from a broken elbow, or with President Barack Obama.

On Sunday, he flew from Washington to Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, aboard a Venezuelan plane, in an abortive attempt to return after being hastily ousted on June 28.

The interim government deployed troops at the airport and prevented him from landing. He later flew to Nicaragua.

The meeting with Clinton will be the highest-level contact between Zelaya and the Obamas administration since the coup, when troops arrested the leftist leader in a dawn raid on his home and expelled him in his pajamas from the country.

In trying to return Zelaya to power, the United States has been working with the OAS, which late Saturday suspended Honduras from its ranks.

AFP, July 7, 2009