Manuel Zelaya is detained at the airport after alleged discovery of undeclared money

(CNN Spanish) -

Former Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was detained this Friday at the Toncontín International Airport in Tegucigalpa after allegedly thousands of dollars were found without declaring him while he was preparing to board a plane to leave the country.

Zelaya posted on Twitter that he was "unfairly" detained as he was preparing to travel to Mexico.

He added that a "bag of money with 18 thousand (dollars) was found, which is not my property."

Yuri Mora, a spokesperson for the Honduran Public Ministry, said in a telephone contact with Televicentro, a CNN affiliate, that the former president “was not detained, it was simply and simply an administrative procedure where you have to fill out a record and subsequently the passenger who is carrying that money leaves and goes on your flight or returns home. "

He added that “the record, a while ago, was ready, but his lawyers arrived and they said that the money had to be counted again… if this had not happened, hours ago former President Zelaya would have left the airport, or failing that, he could have take the flight that took him to his destination.

In a video provided by the Division of Airport Security (DSA) to CNN, it is seen when Zelaya enters an airport room for an inspection, opens a backpack, takes out an envelope with money and when they ask him the amount of cash, he says that "there must be about $ 12,000 here ... it's a mistake."

When asked by a DSA agent if he did, he says, "no, I didn't."

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Honduran laws allow travelers to carry up to US $ 10,000 without declaring that amount to the authorities.

At the end of this article, Zelaya was still being held at the airport.

Manuel Zelaya