Ousted Honduran president Manuel Zelaya denounced on Friday that the country's interim government harassed him and the people who are staying with him at the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa with toxic gases.

Honduras' ousted President Manuel Zelaya (C) holds a surgical mask over his face during a news conference inside the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa September 25, 2009. [Xinhua/Reuters Photo]

Zelaya told a press conference that the interim government was strongly harassing him and the people inside the Brazilian embassy with toxic gases and a strong noise, which has affected his health and that of the other people with him.

Zelaya showed pictures of the policemen setting the device and placing bags with the toxic liquid.

Zelaya urged the international community "to make a strong pressure, to take measure for this bombing against the embassy and our health not to continue."

Doctors who took blood samples of the people inside the Brazilian embassy said that they had a high concentration of ammoniac, hydrogen of cyanide, which blocks the breathing system, produces vomit and abdominal ache.

Meanwhile, the Honduran interim government denied that the police or soldiers have thrown tear gas against the people who were refugees inside the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa, as Zelaya had said before.

"It is totally false that the police has placed a special device to spread a liquid to bother the people inside the Brazilian embassy," the interim government said in a statement.

The interim government said "the only thing going on at this moment is a cleaning operation carried by the municipal mayor."

"The cleaning works are done normally, but in these days we have increased them due to the presence of Zelaya's followers, and the people who arrived to visit him," the statement said.

The interim government said that the police will continue giving protection to Zelaya, his followers and the people of the embassy, and a proof of that is that the only people who entered the building are the ones Zelaya wants to welcome.

Zelaya returned to Honduras on Monday and is staying in the Brazilian embassy to Tegucigalpa.

On Thursday a delegation of four presidential candidates visited Zelaya to set a dialogue and seek a solution to the political crisis of the country triggered by the June 28 coup against Zelaya.

(Xinhua News Agency September 27, 2009)