TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) – Ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya said yesterday he has met with an interim government official and begun dialogue aimed at ending the country’s protracted political crisis.

Zelaya told Radio Globo that he met Wednesday night with an official of the temporary government that forced him out of Honduras at gunpoint on June 28, but he wouldn’t name the official.

In an interview with the radio station yesterday, Zelaya said that the two sides made no progress, but he called the meeting “the beginning to find peaceful solutions”.

Zelaya said that he plans to meet with business and social leaders this week.

Zelaya had been demanding to talk with interim President Roberto Micheletti since Monday when he sneaked back into the country and took shelter at the Brazilian Embassy.

Micheletti’s Government did not immediately comment yesterday.

Troops still surrounded the Embassy, where an increasingly exhausted Zelaya, his family and about 70 supporters, remained sheltered.

But life outside the gates of the two-storey compound was almost back to normal yesterday: After days of paralysing curfews, most children returned to school, airplanes began landing at the airport, borders were open and downtown streets were again crammed with taxis, buses and vendors hawking newspapers, snacks and bubble gum.

Some schools remained closed, but the busy streets were a dramatic shift after the past three days, during which Hondurans were forced to scramble through looted stores for food and police blasted water cannons and tear gas at violent demonstrations.

“It feels excellent,” said Dagoberto Castillo, 27, a mechanic who opened his body-repair shop for the first time this week.

Zelaya was kicked out of Honduras after the Supreme Court endorsed charges of treason and abuse of authority against the leader for repeatedly ignoring court orders to drop plans for a referendum on whether the constitution should be rewritten.

A report by the Library of Congress released yesterday by Republican US Representative Aaron Schock found Zelaya’s removal from office was legal but his expulsion from the country was illegal.

Schock, a Republican from Illinois, told a news conference yesterday in Washington that the interim government should allow Zelaya to leave the embassy, forgoing any further punishment and allowing him to live as a regular citizen.

He also called on the Honduran Government to issue a general amnesty for Zelaya and everyone else involved in the crisis.