9 Exile Nicaraguan Political Groups Form Alliance, Ask U.S. Aid for Rebels

A new alliance of nine exiled Nicaraguan political groups Monday urged Congress to put aside partisan politics and approve aid for the guerrillas fighting the leftist government of their country.

“For the Nicaraguan people, all that remains is the recourse of violence, the recourse of war,” Wilfredo Montalvan said at a Miami press conference.

The alliance, called Nicaraguan Opposition Coordination, includes exiled factions of the main opposition political parties currently functioning in Nicaragua.

The alliance was formed March 7 in Costa Rica, where many Nicaraguan exiles are living. Its members include Montalvan’s Social Democratic Movement of Nicaragua in Exile, the Conservative Party of Nicaragua in Exile, the Social Christian Party of Nicaragua in Exile and the Independent Liberal Party of Nicaragua in Exile.

Spokesmen said Monday that those four exile parties are ideologically identical to the parties with similar names in Nicaragua. They remain organizationally separate, however, to protect the parties in their homeland, which do not openly advocate violence or resistance.

‘Fraternal Relationship’

Montalvan said his group maintains “nothing more than a fraternal relationship” with the Social Democratic Party in Nicaragua. “We have our own structure, our own organization in exile,” he said.

The Social Christians and Social Democrats in Nicaragua belong to an alliance called the Democratic Coordinating Council. The similarity of that alliance’s name with the exile Nicaraguan Opposition Coordination’s is only a coincidence, exile spokesmen said.

The exile alliance also includes three labor-oriented groups, a businessmen’s association and an organization called the Nicaraguan Democratic Movement, headed by Alfonso Robelo.

Until mid-1984, Robelo’s organization was part of the Democratic Revolutionary Alliance, which maintained anti-Sandinista guerrillas in southern Nicaragua led by Eden Pastora. Robelo wanted Pastora’s guerrillas to join forces with the contras who operate in northern and central Nicaragua. Pastora refused, and the two leaders split.