Travel: Hillary Clinton in Honduras says "no consensus" on Cuba at OAS

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton left an Organization of American States conference in Honduras today saying that the group has reached no consensus on moves to allow Cuba to rejoin.

The OAS suspended Cuba in 1962 after Fidel Castro's revolution steered the island toward communism and a close alliance with the Soviet Union. Cuba has said it is uninterested in rejoining the group.

The Secretary said that a frantic day of negotiations had failed to produce agreement among the 34 members on what to do about Cuba. But she said the talks would continue in her absence and that a deal could be possible.

"At this moment there is no consensus and there is no agreement to take any action," she told reporters who accompanied her to Honduras and an earlier stop in El Salvador.

The U.S. had wanted to tie Cuba's potential readmittance to the group to democratic reform. But socialist Latin American leaders wanted to simply revoke Cuba's nearly 50-year-old expulsion from the group.

"A number of countries were pushing hard for a simple resolution that would lift the suspension and nothing else (but) we have been making the case that that is not in the best interests of the OAS," Clinton said.

She allowed that the U.S. was "pretty much by itself" in demanding that any lifting of Cuba's 1962 suspension from the organization be accompanied by demands for Cuba to move toward democratic pluralism, release political prisoners and respect human rights.

"We could support it given the right framework," she said. She claimed success in convincing some nations to join the U.S. side. She did not say who backed the U.S., although Brazil and Chile made supportive comments.

Clinton left the conference and headed to the airport late on Tuesday for a flight to Cairo, where she will join President Barack Obama for his speech to the Muslim world.