Central America The Wright Stuff

By Jill Smolowe

One by one, they trooped to the Capitol Building for closed-door sessions with House Speaker Jim Wright. First came Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega Saavedra, toting a proposal for cease-fire talks between his Sandinista government and the U.S.-backed contras. After Ortega left, Secretary of State George Shultz arrived, followed by the contra leaders. Finally, Miguel Cardinal Obando y Bravo, Nicaragua's ranking churchman, disappeared into Wright's office. An exasperated Reagan Administration, its policymaking efforts sidelined by the frenzy of congressional diplomacy, was forced like the rest of Washington to wait and see what might come of Wright's highly unusual mediation efforts. Complained Presidential Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater: "We don't know what he is up to."

The next day, Ortega emerged from a two-hour meeting with Obando, attended by Wright, and announced an eleven-point cease-fire proposal for Nicaragua. His plan calls for a monthlong cease-fire to take effect on Dec. 5. During the cease-fire, armed contras would be confined to one of three zones spread over a 4,200-sq.-mi. area. All military shipments to the rebels would halt during that period, but supplies of clothes, food and other nonlethal aid could be delivered by neutral international agencies. Under the proposal, any contras who lay down their arms will be granted amnesty and "may join in the political life of the nation with full enjoyment of their rights."

Ortega called his scheme a "proposal, not an ultimatum." Wright found the details patchy, but felt that they had "elements of good faith" for both sides. Publicly, the Reagan Administration was unwilling to rush to judgment. "We don't really know what's in this Ortega-Wright plan, and we just have to wait and see what they're talking about," said Fitzwater. Privately, officials denounced the scheme. "It sounds a lot like the Sandinistas' old unilateral cease-fire," said a naysayer at State. Although Contra Leader Adolfo Calero shot down Ortega's call for the rebels to disarm, the contras seemed to withhold judgment.

Ortega's announcement capped a dramatic week of high-stakes diplomacy that included conciliatory gestures, intransigent demands, petty snubs and perhaps the promise of some real movement. But while talks between the Sandinistas and contras looked more promising, the prospects for talks between Managua's comandantes and U.S. officials remained dim, despite expressions of interest on both sides. Once Wright entered the picture, the bizarre possibility emerged that Ortega might try an end run on the White House and secure congressional approval for his plans through Wright.

Certainly Wright was at the center of the action. Last August the Texas Democrat and President Reagan co-sponsored a peace plan for Central America. Two days later in Guatemala City, five of the region's Presidents, including Ortega, signed a different accord, this one championed by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez. Wright quickly threw his support behind the homegrown pact and invited Arias to address Congress. Since then Wright has repeatedly warned the Reagan Administration that no new funds for military aid to the contras will be approved so long as the peace process remains alive. At the same time, Wright has turned down two Sandinista invitations to serve as a mediator. "I do not aspire to any role except as a friend," he maintained last week.

Yet it was hard to regard his mysterious behind-the-scenes maneuverings as anything short of mediation. Wright's attempts to edge the Sandinistas and contras closer to talks made the Reagan Administration uneasy, if not downright furious. "We don't think it's desirable for the U.S. to inject itself directly into these talks," said State Department Spokesman Charles Redman. Fitzwater was blunter. "Anytime you start seeing stories of independent plans," he said, "you have to start being a little nervous." Others in Washington charged that Wright's horse trading usurped Reagan's foreign policy authority. Said Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona, a supporter of contra aid: "I think it's at best unseemly and at worst unconstitutional."

The muted furor served Ortega's purposes well. In coming to Washington, his first such visit since 1979, Ortega aimed to promote Nicaragua's peace gestures, pressure Reagan to take steps toward talks and paint the contras as "sons of Reagan." The propaganda strategy was effective. While Ortega actually achieved little beyond handing Obando a cease-fire proposal, which he could have done in Managua, he received considerable attention. The final masterstroke: a tour of the Lincoln and Viet Nam War memorials.

Ortega and Reagan had begun the week on more equal footing. Like two riverboat gamblers, they had each invited the other to a game of poker, then each tried to fix the rules to his own advantage. The first bid came from Reagan. In a speech to members of the Organization of American States, he said that once the Sandinistas have begun "serious negotiations" with the contras, his Administration would "be ready to meet jointly with the foreign ministers of all five Central American nations, including the Sandinistas' representative." The call for "serious" talks was purposefully vague, and one underlying message was plain: no bilateral talks between the U.S. and Nicaragua.

Still, Reagan's speech was a milestone. For the first time since the signing of the Guatemala plan, Reagan had made a concrete gesture to advance the peace process. The next day, the Secretary of State announced before the OAS that the Administration would withhold until next year a request to Congress for $270 million in additional aid to the contras. His too was a mixed message. Shultz pledged to "give peace every chance," then vowed that contra funding would continue until "full democracy is established" in Nicaragua.

Ortega, however, appeared to read encouragement into Washington's more conciliatory approach. In a midair interview en route to the OAS meeting, he told the New York Times that if Reagan invited him to talk, Ortega would be willing to have contra leaders at the meeting. For the first time, a Sandinista official was publicly expressing a willingness to meet contra leaders face to face. The Administration rejected the offer, claiming that such an arrangement would devalue the contras' negotiating position.

Ortega struck back in his address before the 31-nation OAS. He indulged in a hefty dose of eye-glazing anti-Reagan rhetoric, charging that the President was reneging on a promise made in the Reagan-Wright plan to open a "direct dialogue, government to government," once the Sandinistas initiated contacts with the the contra leadership. In fact, only an early draft called for bilateral negotiations; the final version insisted on regional talks.

Given the bad feelings between Reagan and Ortega, easy concessions are not expected. "These people are in a war of propaganda," says a Honduran , official. "Neither side wants to be the one to give in." Still, the debate over bilateral or multilateral talks is more than mere posturing. The Sandinistas, who know that renewed bilateral talks will lend their regime prestige, argue that until the U.S. forthrightly announces its support for the Guatemala plan, it is not entitled to participate in regional negotiations. "Why should we let Reagan take part?" asks Nicaragua's Foreign Minister Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann. "He doesn't welcome us to sit in on his talks when he meets with other nations."

Washington's position reflects the anxiety of its allies in the region. The leaders of El Salvador and Honduras, for example, fear that their concerns will be neglected if they are excluded from the negotiations. "We've been burned before," said a Honduran official, alluding to the Reagan-Wright plan, which was unveiled without consulting the allies. Last week State Department officials continued to insist publicly that any U.S. talks with Nicaragua must include the other Central American countries. But privately they said Shultz was pushing Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Costa Rica to back bilateral talks.

Once Sandinista-contra talks get under way, they could stumble on any number of points. Ortega has stated plainly that there will be no political negotiations. But the contras are already hinting at some measure of power sharing. Among the demands they floated last week: that the Sandinistas should disband their nine-member directorate, and that the contras should be granted control of the territory they now hold. The contras still hope to negotiate their demands face to face with the Sandinistas rather than through an intermediary. Yet as of last week that scenario looked unlikely. When a Sandinista group ran into Contra Leader Calero at a Washington reception, they refused to shake his outstretched hand, then walked out of the room even before the hors d'oeuvres were served.

With reporting by Ricardo Chavira and Nancy Traver/Washington