Contadora Talks to Focus on Peace Force

U.S. allies in Central America will recommend an expansion of the authority of a proposed peacekeeping force in the region when the stalled Contadora talks are resumed here today.

Also, according to a document to be considered at the talks, they will propose that a “peace fund” be set up to finance the force.

The document was drawn up by the foreign ministers of El Salvador, Costa Rica and Honduras and has been circulated privately to diplomats in the region over the last few weeks. It is expected to be the focal point of two days of talks among the vice foreign ministers of the four Contadora nations, the sponsors of the peace effort and their counterparts from the five Central American countries.

The so-called Contadora Group consists of Colombia, Mexico, Panama and Venezuela. The group takes its name from the Panamanian island where the group first met, in January, 1983.

Last September, the sponsors proposed a peace formula that won the immediate endorsement of the leftist Sandinista government of Nicaragua. At the prompting of the United States, however, Honduras, El Salvador and Costa Rica proposed a series of amendments that Nicaragua rejected.

The process has been stalemated ever since. A round of talks scheduled for mid-February was postponed because of a diplomatic dispute--it has since been resolved--between Nicaragua and Costa Rica over the issue of political asylum.

It remains to be seen whether the Central American countries can resolve the differences between the original plan and the alternative version proposed by the U.S. allies. One of the key differences is that the latter plan would allow the United States to continue to carry out military maneuvers in the region.

These maneuvers, forbidden in the earlier version, are considered a danger by Nicaragua. U.S. diplomats see the maneuvers as a way to exercise military pressure on the Sandinista government.

Contadora diplomats, who have consistently expressed optimism about the eventual outcome of the talks despite frequent disappointments, pointed to recent statements by Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega that seem to agree to some modifications of the original plan.

The document that calls for changes in the proposed peacekeeping force goes into considerable detail about the force’s composition and the extent of its powers.

The force’s mission would be to ensure that no country exceeds the size of national arsenals fixed by the plan and to control the introduction of new weapons into the area.

To carry out this mission, the force would be authorized to establish “points of control, patrols and observation posts all across the international frontiers and within each national territory,” as the new document puts it.

The force would have the authority to conduct on-site inspections “with or without prior notification.”

It would be made up of people outside Central America and outside the Contadora Group. It is not clear whether the force would be military or civilian--it is referred to as an “international corps of inspectors”--but it would be given explicit authority to carry weapons and other “appropriate” equipment.