Analysis : Chances Fade for El Salvador Peace : Hardening Stances Dim Even the Likelihood of New Talks

The weekend collapse of efforts by the government of El Salvador and the rebels it is fighting to resume peace negotiations reveals not only momentary disagreements but a steady hardening of positions in the 6 1/2-year civil war there.

Even if a resumption of peace talks had begun on schedule this Friday in the Salvadoran battle-zone town of Sesori--something that now appears impossible--chances for progress were remote. There is little room for compromise between the U.S.-backed government of President Jose Napoleon Duarte and Marxist-led rebels of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front.

The Sesori talks would have been the third attempt at peace negotiations. Two 1984 meetings held in the Salvadoran towns of La Palma and Ayagualo ended with no substantial agreements.

Preparatory talks this past weekend in Panama City broke down in discord over security arrangements for the scheduled Sesori negotiations. Both sides complained that conditions set by the other for Sesori were unacceptable--although, of course, such problems had been resolved when arrangements were made for the meetings in La Palma and Ayagualo.

Government’s Rejection

In Panama City, for one thing, the Duarte government rejected a guerrilla request that army troops be withdrawn from Sesori before the talks. Government representatives argued that to comply with the demand would violate the nation’s constitution, which makes the army responsible for all security.

“No country could accept turning over a part of its national territory to a group of armed men who have no legitimacy,” Salvadoran Vice President Rodolfo Castillo Claramount told reporters in Panama.

Castillo’s comments overlooked the fact that during during the first session of talks in October, 1984, at La Palma, the government willingly withdrew its troops before the negotiations began. In La Palma, security was provided by unarmed Boy Scouts.

On Monday, Duarte sought to blame the rebels for the impasse. “This next round (in Sesori) has been permanently boycotted by the sectors-in-arms (guerrillas) because they don’t want to negotiate peace,” Duarte said in San Salvador. “They want a dialogue of war.”

Fear for Lives

The rebels, meanwhile, announced that under no circumstances could they meet in a town occupied by the Salvadoran army. Such a concession, they asserted, would put the lives of their representatives in jeopardy.

“We can’t place the safety of our leaders in the hands of those we consider criminals,” Miguel Saenz, a member of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front and the Salvadoran Communist Party, told reporters here on Saturday.

The rebel protest ignored the circumstances of the December, 1984, talks in Ayagualo, just outside San Salvador. During that round, Salvadoran army troops, all fully armed, kept a vigil on the grounds of the seminary where the negotiations took place.

After the talks, a guerrilla officials made an uncensored, anti-government speech, while army troops looked on.

In any event, the rebels on Monday used the collapse of the Sesori arrangements to push one of their own political themes: that Duarte is a puppet of a hard-line military not disposed to negotiate.

“This shows that the military is the real strength and Duarte has no control,” said Guillermo Ungo, head of the Revolutionary Democratic Front, an organization of civilian dissidents that serves as the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front’s political wing.

These moves and countermoves cloud the fundamental problems that have dogged peace moves since their inception in La Palma as well as some new conditions that make successful peace talks unlikely.

First, the Duarte government and the guerrillas hold opposing conceptions of the talks. Duarte considers the rebels outlaws--hence, his insistence that negotiations be held in churches where the rebels enter as if seeking refuge.

The government’s goal in the talks, expressed again by Castillo as recently as last week, is to “incorporate” the rebels into an established political system, which Duarte currently heads.

“After they (the rebels) accept incorporation into the democratic process and decide to abandon violence as a method for obtaining power, then everything opens up,” Castillo said in Panama.

The Guerrilla View

For their part, the guerrillas see themselves, not as outlaws, but as legitimate contenders for power in El Salvador. They view the peace talks as negotiations between equal participants in a civil war. They maintain that the Duarte government has no legal right to rule.

“We don’t see the Duarte government as legitimate,” said guerrilla representative Saenz.

The climate for negotiations in Duarte’s government also has cooled. Last year, the rebels kidnaped Duarte’s daughter and held her captive for 44 days, and since then, Duarte is said to be less inclined to make important concessions to the rebels.

Meanwhile, as the Salvadoran armed forces have improved their battlefield performance, it has become more resistant to considering compromise with the rebels. That attitude appears to be evident in a military decision to suddenly occupy Sesori on Aug. 29, five days after government and rebel negotiators selected it as the site for new talks.

Since the Ayagualo session, guerrilla attitudes toward conditions for peace also have stiffened. Joaquin Villalobos, considered to be the rebels’ paramount military leader, has said publicly that the guerrillas will never lay down their arms.

Party Announced

Also, the Farabundo Marti Front has announced the formation, still not accomplished, of a single Marxist-Leninist political party. Such a party would probably relegate to the sidelines the Social Democratic allies of the rebels, who include some of the leaders of the Revolutionary Democratic Front. This would make Duarte, a Christian Democrat, and the armed forces even more distrustful than they already are.

Guerrilla leaders contend that although the rebels may not be winning the war on the battlefield, there can be no peace without their cooperation. Their tactics have evolved into a low-intensity style that the rebels, in El Salvador and elsewhere in Central America, call a “prolonged popular war.”