Habib Cancels Latin Mission; Peace Bid Cited

WASHINGTON — At the request of Costa Rica, which is seeking to promote a new Central American peace plan, presidential envoy Philip C. Habib has canceled a scheduled visit to the troubled region, Latin American diplomatic sources said Thursday.

State Department spokesman Charles Redman said only that Habib “had met with all the people he was planning to meet” during the last week on a visit to the member nations of the so-called Contadora Group--Panama, Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela--which is seeking a regional peace plan.

But a Latin diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity said the change in itinerary was sought by Costa Rican Foreign Minister Rodrigo Madrigal and his country’s newly elected president, Oscar Arias Sanchez, who are attempting to draft a peace initiative that would exclude direct U.S. involvement from the process.

“This is a four-front campaign,” the source said. “Costa Rica has to persuade the United States to keep hands off, convince the contras that their interests would be adequately represented by the internal opposition, get the Sandinistas to the table and unify the neighboring Central American presidents--all this without offending the Contadora nations.”

The United States has opposed the draft of a peace treaty from the Contadora Group, contending that it was one sided in favor of Nicaragua’s Marxist government and damaging to the interests of the U.S.-backed contra forces and Central American governments opposed to the Sandinistas. Because of Washington’s position and a hardening of the Sandinistas’ own stance on the proposed treaty, the Contadora negotiations have languished.

According to diplomatic sources, the essential element of the new proposal by Costa Rica--which is not a Contadora member--would be organizing talks in which leaders of the internal opposition in Nicaragua could take part but not the contras, with whom the Sandinistas have refused to meet.