U.S. Stands Alone at U.N. in Defending Its Nicaragua Embargo

The United States stood alone in the Security Council on Thursday to defend its economic embargo against Nicaragua in a debate that climaxed in a verbal duel between Soviet envoy Oleg A. Troyanovsky and U.S. delegate Jose Sorzano.

Troyanovsky and more than a dozen other speakers denounced the Reagan Administration’s action as “coercion” and as intervention in the affairs of Nicaragua. Sorzano asserted that neither the United Nations Charter nor that of the Organization of American States precludes a unilateral embargo on trade.

“The United States decision to cease trading with Nicaragua is primarily intended to prevent Nicaragua from deriving benefits from trade with the United States which would, directly or indirectly, support its illegal, aggressive and destabilizing course of action in the region,” Sorzano declared.

Draft Resolution

Nicaraguan Ambassador Javier Chamorro Mora, who opened the debate Wednesday, introduced a draft resolution Thursday that would have the Security Council “regret . . . coercive economic measures decreed against the government of Nicaragua” and call on all “interested states” to abstain from such actions.

The United States was mentioned in a single clause, an appeal to Washington and Managua to resume the bilateral talks that had been held in Manzanillo, Mexico, until last December. The talks were suspended by the United States in January.

The language of the draft resolution has been softened to attract the maximum support from the 15-nation council. An earlier version had called on the Security Council to condemn the embargo.

Vote May Come Today

The resolution may be put to a vote as early as today. Of the U.S. allies, only Britain is expect to abstain, while the other 13 members of the council are believed ready to support the resolution. The United States, one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, holds veto power over all such resolutions.

Troyanovsky showed no hesitation in accusing the United States of “escalation of anti-Nicaraguan action aimed at toppling the legal government of Nicaragua.” Troyanovsky said that counterrevolutionary forces loyal to the late dictator, Anastasio Somoza, are “directly coordinated by American personnel.”

In addition, the Soviet ambassador declared that U.S. military maneuvers are turning other Central American states into a “springboard for an anti-Nicaraguan war” being planned by the Pentagon “based on its experiences in Lebanon and Grenada.”

Soviet-Nazi Pact Cited

Troyanovsky’s attack drew a bitter rejoinder from Sorzano. The U.S. delegate traced the history of the secret agreements between the Soviet Union and Hitler’s Germany immediately before World War II, in which the two carved up the Baltic states and Poland between them.

“So much for the Soviet noninterference in the affairs of its neighbors,” Sorzano declared at the close of his remarks. “So much, too, about Soviet attitudes toward Nazi tyranny.”

Troyanovsky, calling Sorzano’s accusations a “hackneyed trick,” replied with a thrust at President Reagan’s visit last Sunday to the Bitburg cemetery in West Germany.

“The United States has committed true sacrilege against the victims of fascism when a few days ago it laid wreathes on the graves of the henchmen of the SS,” Troyanovsky said.