Word: ortega
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Miranda's tale comes at a delicate moment. Arias' accord, signed by Nicaragua, includes a pledge to halt aid to regional rebel forces and a vague commitment to reduce armed forces. "While Daniel Ortega was talking about ((peace))," Miranda charges, "he was taking part in discussions to have by far the largest armed forces in the region." The bill for the buildup would allegedly be footed by Moscow. Last week, as Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev and President Reagan basked in goodwill, Miranda was kept from sight. After five weeks of debriefing by CIA, Pentagon and State Department officials, four reporters...
...question, of course, is whether the major can be trusted. After Miranda sought protection at the U.S. embassy in Mexico City in late October, Humberto Ortega charged that his deputy had been "touched by the CIA" a month earlier. Miranda claims that the defection was his own idea, born of a mounting disillusionment with the Sandinista regime. There seems little doubt that at least some of his information is accurate. As Ortega's right-hand man, Miranda had access to high-level meetings and sensitive documents. Ortega has conceded that Miranda's defection was the "most important betrayal" ever suffered...
Miranda charged that in early October Humberto Ortega, the head of the Soviet military mission in Nicaragua (identified as a "General Zaitsev") and his Cuban counterpart discussed a five-year military plan extending through 1995. Among Miranda's documents is an agreement outlining the plan, which specifies that Nicaragua will receive twelve MiGs, an additional squadron of Mi-24 combat choppers, and medium-range surface-to-air missiles. Miranda notes that the Sandinistas could use the MiGs to intercept supply flights to the U.S.-backed contras. The Reagan Administration has repeatedly warned that the delivery of MiGs to Nicaragua would...
Some of Miranda's information was painstakingly detailed. Charging corruption within the Sandinista directorate, he claimed that Humberto Ortega, under other names, maintains a bank account, No. 58946, in a Swiss branch of the National Bank of Paris. As of last October, Miranda claimed, the account totaled $1,495,596, all of it diverted between 1981 and 1986 from Defense Ministry coffers...
Last week Humberto Ortega had other matters to deal with. He announced that Sandinista infantrymen had shot down a single-engine Cessna plane and captured $ an American "mercenary," James Denby, 57, a pilot who divides his time between a corn and soybean farm in Carlinville, Ill., and a ranch in Costa Rica. Two days before the incident, Denby had requested permission to fly over Nicaragua to reach Costa Rica. The Sandinistas charged that Denby was on an espionage mission for the contras. But it appeared that if it came down to comparing the propaganda value of a Denby with that...