Posted Friday, Nov. 27, 2009, 1:40 p.m.

After bowing out from the helm of a rocky Honduran mediation process, President Oscar Arias has voiced support for Honduras' controversial presidential elections set for Sunday.

“If this Sunday's elections are transparent … I'm going to request the Ibero-American countries in this meeting in Portugal that we should recognize the future Honduran government,” Arias said in a statement.

Arias' remarks came as the international community grew divided over the question of whether Honduras is able to hold fair and transparent elections.

Leaders in Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Guatemala, Paraguay, Spain and Venezuela, according to global media reports, have refused to recognize the winner of Sunday's vote, charging that one key issue – that ousted President Manuel Zelaya be restored – remains unresolved.

Meanwhile, Peru and Panama – and now Costa Rica – have joined the United States in publicly supporting the elections as the only way forward for the country that has been torn since Zelaya's June 28 ouster.

Arias said the countries that refuse to recognize the vote's legitimacy should ask themselves why they recognize the Iranian and Afghan elections, “when those elections were not clean.”

He said, “By wishing to punish the person that the Honduran people choose in the next elections, who you're really punishing are the humble Hondurans.”

See related story: Amid Boycott, Honduras Prepares for Vote