QUITO, June 28 (Xinhua) -- The governments of Ecuador and Venezuela on Sunday condemned the coup earlier in the day that removed Honduran President Manuel Zelaya from power, and demanded that Zelaya be returned to office.

Ecuador said it would not accept any change of Honduran presidency and called for an urgent meeting of the Group of Rio to discuss the situation, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

"Ecuador's government energetically reject the coup committed this morning against Honduras' legitimate government, led by President Manuel Zelaya, as an act that violates the most basic normal of democratic cohabitation and international law," the statement said.

Ecuador's statement said that Ecuador had joined the list of nations calling for an extraordinary session of the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States, to discuss the situation in Honduras, and described the coup as "a flagrant transgression of articles 19 and 20 of the Inter-American Democratic Charter."

Venezuela called for the international community to take measures to solve the coup d'etat and to condemn that nation's military, Venezuela's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Zelaya was "kidnapped, removed from his residence by force, held incommunicado during several house and violently exiled by coup plotting, unpatriotic soldiers," said the ministry.

Zelaya arrived in Costa Rica early on Sunday, after being seized by soldiers at his home and forced to board a plane. He told media there that he had been kidnapped as part of a coup plot organized by a group of military officers.

The statement said that hooded Honduran soldiers had also held Honduran Foreign Minister Patricia Rodas and had seized and roughed up ambassadors from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.

"These shameful soldiers are responsible under both local and international law for crimes they are committing against the constitution and the law," the statement added.

In a separate broadcast ahead of the issuing of the statement, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said that if soldiers were to repeat their attacks on the nation's ambassador they would in effect be declaring war on Venezuela.