Duarte Gets Needed Boost From Regional Peace Plan

For months, labor unions and student groups have blanketed walls of El Salvador’s capital with black, anti-government graffiti. Then, one night last week, President Jose Napoleon Duarte struck back.

With white paint and stencils, government workers covered the hostile slogans with a message of their own: “Duarte. Peace. Duarte. Peace.”

Duarte’s signing of a preliminary regional peace agreement Aug. 7 in Guatemala City, along with the leaders of the four other Central American countries, has rejuvenated his presidency and rekindled hope for negotiations with the guerrillas that have been stalled for nearly three years.

Government officials, diplomats and even the guerrillas of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front have expressed cautious optimism that the peace plan may open a crack in the political deadlock that has kept this country in a civil war for more than seven years.

“The importance of the plan is that it opens possibilities,” said Ruben Zamora, leader of the Revolutionary Democratic Front, a coalition of the exiled leaders of several political parties and labor and other groups that serves the Farabundo Marti Front as a political arm. “But after that, it is up to the government and us to see if we can take advantage of it.”

Duarte proposed on Thursday that he meet with the guerrillas on Sept. 15, the day Central America celebrates its independence from Spain. The guerrillas accepted, saying that the talks should last for two days and be attended by top-level officials of both sides. Later, Duarte said their meeting could take place only if the guerrillas renounce violence, casting doubt on the likelihood of such talks soon.

The government and guerrillas last held high-level talks here in November, 1984. A tentative agreement by the two sides to talk again last September collapsed when they were unable to settle issues of security around the site they had picked.

Since then, amid opposition charges of government incompetence and a deteriorating economy, Duarte has not had the political strength to call for another round of talks, which are opposed by the armed forces and the political extreme right.

Now, the peace plan is taking the country’s mind off the economy, and international attention has restored some of Duarte’s political strength.

“This document creates political space because negotiations are legalized by five presidents” and backed by the rest of Latin America, one of Duarte’s closest political advisers said. “The military will have no excuse to attempt a coup.”

Accord Favors Duarte

The peace plan, signed by the presidents of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, calls for cease-fires, amnesties and peace talks in the Central American countries where there is fighting--in Nicaragua and El Salvador principally, and to a lesser extent, in Guatemala. It urges outside governments to stop giving aid and sanctuary to insurgent forces and calls for press freedom, installation of democratic institutions and for future talks on limiting armies, weaponry and foreign military influence in the region.

In the short term, the accord favors Duarte over the guerrillas, just as it favors Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega over the contras fighting to oust the Sandinista government in Managua. The plan calls for international recognition of the Nicaraguan and Salvadoran governments and does not require either to hold early elections or to draw up a new constitution.

Conversely, the plan denies legitimacy to the insurgents in both countries by denouncing armed struggle and requiring the governments to negotiate only with unarmed groups. Although the plan distinguishes between “irregular forces,” as the contras are called in Latin America, and “insurgencies,” as the Salvadoran guerrillas are called, it treats the two equally.

The Salvadoran guerrillas reject any comparison to the contras.

Requires Aid to Stop

They assert that their movement “is a national movement with its rear guard inside the country, with enormous popular support. . . . We do not feel dependent on external support. The contras are an instrument created by the Reagan Administration . . . with their rear guard in Honduras . . . and they cannot survive without foreign sustenance.”

The plan would require the United States and Honduras to stop aiding the contras, and Nicaragua would have to cease its assistance to the Salvadoran guerrillas. It also puts international pressure on the Nicaraguan contras and Salvadoran guerrillas to comply with an accord they have not signed.

The peace plan gives Duarte a chance to regain some of the popular support he has lost because his government has fulfilled the expectations of most of the poor and working-class people who voted for him in 1984, when he promised peace and prosperity.

He and his Christian Democratic Party need support, because elections for the national Legislative Assembly are scheduled for May, 1988, and presidential elections will held in May, 1989.

New Strategy Needed

The guerrillas, meanwhile, must seek a new political strategy. The unions, students and political groups that support them have been calling for peace and dialogue--a call now usurped by Duarte.

Duarte’s renewed strength to negotiate with the guerrillas does not mean that the war can be ended easily. And the government and economy will find it hard to progress as long as the fighting goes on.

Duarte still must contend with the powerful Salvadoran military establishment, which wants a cease-fire before any negotiations are conducted. Some military officials reportedly have been grumbling that the peace plan yields far too much to Nicaragua’s Sandinistas.

Duarte is not likely to yield to the guerrillas’ demand that U.S. military aid for his government be halted and that American advisers be withdrawn from this country.

In May, the guerrillas submitted an 18-point plan for what they called “humanizing” the war. In it, they offered to stop using mines and economic sabotage if the armed forces would stop using artillery and aerial attacks. The government has not responded.

Government Standing Firm

In July, 1986, the guerrillas offered a six-point proposal that outlined their conditions for ending the war. In it, they modified their previous demands for new elections and a new constitution and called for a “reorganization of the government, integrating representatives of all sectors”--including the guerrillas.

The government’s position has been that the guerrillas must put down their arms and take part in the legal political system.

Foreign Minister Ricardo Acevedo Peralta reiterated that position Friday in discussing the planned dialogue.

“This is not about negotiating power but about the conditions that would facilitate the reincorporation of the armed groups into the democratic process,” Acevedo said.

The government is expected to use the peace plan to put pressure on the Revolutionary Democratic Front to split away from the armed guerrillas and field candidates in the forthcoming elections. Zamora’s party has already sent people back into El Salvador to test the political waters, but so far it has maintained that conditions do not exist here for fair elections and safety for its candidates.

Political Violence on the Rise

“We have been more willing to participate in the national political arena,” said Zamora, “but we don’t accept incorporation into the democratic process because we dispute that there is democracy in El Salvador.”

Meantime, diplomats and political observers say they expect the guerrillas to step up activities in the weeks ahead to try to strengthen their position for any negotiations that develop. The level of political violence has already risen here in the capital since the peace plan was announced.

On Thursday, three policemen were shot to death and three others were wounded in apparent guerrilla attacks. Four unidentified men were shot to death in the western province of Sonsonate. Also on Thursday, security forces occupied a Social Security hospital and two health clinics where workers have been on strike for more than a month.

On Friday, a professor was shot to death by unidentified gunmen at the National University.

As mandated by the peace plan, the five Central American foreign ministers will meet Wednesday and Thursday in San Salvador to begin working out some of the details of the preliminary accord. The plan calls for cease-fires, amnesties and “democratization” measures to be in effect within 90 days of agreement’s signing, or Nov. 7.