U.S. Laying Ground for Direct Intervention, Nicaragua Charges in Security Council

Nicaragua, bringing accusations against the United States before the U.N. Security Council for the 15th time, accused the Reagan Administration on Friday of “laying the ground for possible direct intervention” following clashes this week between Sandinista troops and Contra forces along the border with Honduras.

U.S. Ambassador Herbert S. Okun rejected the charges, asserting that the Sandinista regime conducted a “planned offensive” against neighboring Honduras, aimed at destroying the Contras. He urged the Sandinistas to expedite the establishment of democracy in Nicaragua in accordance with agreements signed by the five Central American presidents last August.

Presenting the case for Nicaragua was Rita Delia Casco, a Foreign Ministry official not previously seen here who flew from Managua for the debate.

“He is not seeking merely to involve U.S. military in Central America,” Casco said of President Reagan’s order Wednesday dispatching 3,150 troops to Honduras. “He is also trying to abort” the August agreements.

Jorge Ramon Hernandez Alcerro, speaking for Honduras, declared flatly that Nicaragua invaded his country and remains inside Honduras.

“Honduras would have been entitled to call for a Security Council meeting itself,” he said, “but preferred to resolve the problem diplomatically.”

Hernandez rejected as “unnecessary” a proposal by Nicaragua that U.N. Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar send an investigating body to the scene of the border dispute.

Late Friday, Perez de Cuellar announced that he will send a fact-finding mission in response to the Nicaraguan request. He said the mission will be composed of a political officer and military officers from U.N. headquarters and may leave as early as Tuesday.

The council suspended debate to permit nonaligned and Latin American diplomats to draft a statement in support of the investigating commission. During the interval, Okun and Casco engaged in a lengthy and animated conversation. But when the debate resumed, there was no statement.

After the rebuttals from the three principals, the council adjourned and Okun told reporters the debate was ended. Casco, however, said she will remain here for further discussions with council members, and she did not rule out another session dealing with the problem.

In his rebuttal, Okun said the Sandinistas’ problem “is not with the United States but with its own people.” He again urged the Nicaraguan regime to negotiate with the Contras and institute the freedoms called for by the August regional accord.

Trading Charges

After the session, Hernandez and Casco traded charges through separate news conferences.

The Honduran repeated his contention that Sandinista troops are still inside his country, and he warned that their presence cannot continue indefinitely. He told a questioner that he had no information from Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, about the possibility that U.S. troops might extend their maneuver area closer to the scene of the combat if the Sandinistas fail to withdraw.

“If the Nicaraguan troops are still inside Honduras, why then does Honduras refuse to have an independent body investigate?” the Nicaraguan official demanded.

Casco told reporters that Managua had permitted border visits by foreign correspondents, invited a U.N. mission and would even welcome inspection by members of Congress.

Earlier, the U.N. General Assembly met to discuss the order by U.S. Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III to close down the observer mission of the Palestine Liberation Organization under legislation passed by Congress last year.

Perez de Cuellar submitted a report on the matter in which he held that the dispute should be mediated under the terms of the 1956 U.S. agreement with the world organization establishing its headquarters in New York. Meese previously rejected such mediation and is expected to ask for a federal court ruling Monday.

Zehdi Labib Terzi, the PLO representative, and other Arab representatives denounced the planned closing of the PLO office as a violation of international law. The United States, in line with its policy of nonparticipation in the debate on the issue, did not speak.

The United States issued an unusual statement related to the debate, however, saying that the Soviet news agency Tass, “seriously misreported” comments by U.S. Ambassador Vernon A. Walters in a speech in Geneva on March 8. The dispatch reported that Walters was seeking the transfer of the assembly’s meeting site to Geneva and also reported a Soviet Foreign Ministry official, Vadim Perfilyev, as saying that the U.S. envoy was also seeking to reduce the U.S. contribution to the U.N. budget below its present 20% level.

“I have not received any instructions to enter into talks with the U.N. Secretariat to seek a reduction of the U.S. assessed contributions to the world body,” Walters said in a clarifying statement sent to the United Nations.