Word: contra
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...than successfully, as it turned out -- to open a rift between the U.S. and Western Europe over the trade embargo that Washington imposed on Nicaragua earlier this month. At the same time, Nicaraguan troops were foraying along the frontier with Honduras in a continuing effort to contain anti-Sandinista contra rebels ensconced in that border region. Closer to home, yet another challenge was looming for the Sandinistas: slowly deepening resentment among many Nicaraguans against their revolutionary leadership...
...Ortega's transatlantic tour was useful to Nicaragua largely as a public relations exercise, the struggle on the country's northern border had more concrete significance. The contras, short of supplies after the denial of U.S. covert aid last October, have gradually withdrawn most of their forces to Honduran base camps to await help from a network of private sources (see box). Beginning early this month, Nicaraguan infantry backed by artillery began zeroing in on the main contra camp, known as Las Vegas. Finally an estimated 1,200 Nicaraguan troops launched an unprecedented cross-border assault reaching up to four...
...reason for the shortages is the disruption caused by the three-year contra war. Another lies in government economic policies. The Sandinistas claim that 60% of the Nicaraguan economy is in private hands. That assertion, says Ramiro Gurdian, vice president of the Superior Council of Private Enterprise, is "fake. The private sector owns the means of production, but the government tells you what to do. What decision is left...
...Sandinistas. The main opposition group outside the legislature, the Coordinadora Democratica Nicaraguense, refused to participate in the election and remains leaderless and in disarray. In any case, the work of the Assembly is largely peripheral. Under a constitutional state of emergency declared in 1982 in response to the contra threats, almost all important decisions are enacted by presidential decree...
...fledgling trade embargo is likely to have little bearing on the outcome of the contra issue. The Sandinistas have already announced a trade offensive in Western Europe and Canada to soften the economic blow, which affects $168 million in U.S.-Nicaraguan commerce. Last week Ortega added a West European tour to his East bloc visit in order to lead that effort...