No Nicaraguan Troop Entries, Honduras Says

The military today denied that Nicaraguan troops have crossed the border into Honduras to stop contra rebels from entering Nicaragua.

On Tuesday, Reagan Administration officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Sandinista forces moved into Honduras in an effort to prevent the rebels from advancing during the coming dry season. (Story on Page 13.)

The U.S. sources did not provide a precise estimate of the number of Sandinistas involved in the alleged border crossing and offered no evidence to back their report.

The contras, who are waging a guerrilla campaign to topple the leftist Sandinista regime, operate from camps on the Honduran side of the ill-defined jungle mountain border separating the two nations.

‘Not Happening’

Responding to the Washington report, armed forces spokesman Col. Jose Oscar Flores said, “The (incursion) situation is not happening.”

He added, however, that the 560-mile border “is a zone of permanent tension.”

Flores said about 3,000 Honduran soldiers are guarding the border. He said there has been no recent confrontation between Honduran and Nicaraguan troops.

The Sandinista troops, according to the U.S. officials, are near several contra bases in the Las Vegas salient, a point of Honduras that juts into Nicaragua.

The Honduran military has closed off much of the border to reporters, so it was impossible to confirm the reports.