Word: ortega
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...outcome is too close to call, and some Washington officials point out that previous votes were also accompanied by dire predictions about the fate of peace in the region. But Republicans and Democrats agree that much will depend on Ortega's performance over the next few days. Two weeks ago, in an eleventh hour attempt to keep a five-month-old Central American peace process alive, Ortega offered several striking concessions, among them promises to lift Nicaragua's state of emergency and to hold direct talks with the guerrillas. Last week he moved to honor those pledges, restoring civil liberties...
Certainly, Ortega has used well-timed gestures in the past to sway Congress. Shortly after the Reagan Administration made known its intent last September to seek $270 million in contra funding, Ortega went on a public-relations offensive. He announced the reopening of two opposition news outlets, the newspaper La Prensa and Radio Catolica, and pardoned 16 jailed rebel sympathizers. Sensing defeat, the U.S. Administration scaled back its request to just $30 million. Still, Ortega pressed on. He agreed to indirect talks with the contras and designated Miguel Cardinal Obando y Bravo as the mediator. In the end, Congress granted...
...Ortega is not letting up as the Reagan Administration presses its current campaign. His proposal last week for an international commission that would include members of the U.S. political parties was coupled with an offer to ( permit the contras to continue receiving humanitarian aid from the U.S. and other foreign sources. By offering the U.S. a role as both guarantor and benefactor in postwar Nicaragua, Ortega seems to be playing to a pet theme of the President's that Reagan has applied to arms treaties with the Soviets: trust, but verify...
...Ortega's shrewd diplomacy has already had considerable impact on the pending aid vote. Just a month ago, the Reagan Administration still planned to request $270 million in contra funds, much of it to be designated as military aid. Last week, however, Fitzwater conceded that the "$270 million figure has been overtaken by events." After several days of discussions, the White House decided to ask this week for less than $50 million, with only 10% earmarked for lethal purposes. But Capitol Hill buzzed with proposals to postpone the aid vote. Among those championing a delay was Senate Minority Leader Robert...
...that we've been in the vanguard of making these proposals and urging these results." As happened during the U.S.-Soviet arms negotiations that led to last December's treaty, the White House is coming out second best on the public-relations front. Like Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Ortega has learned to curry international favor by responding to U.S. demands with the answer least expected by the White House...