Preliminary Pact OKd to End Nicaragua War : Sandinistas, Contras Sign Broad Accord

Sandinista and Contra leaders signed a preliminary agreement Wednesday night to end the Nicaraguan war.

The accord calls for the extension of an informal 2-day-old truce until April 1, followed by a formal, supervised 60-day cease-fire, a phased release of at least 3,360 political prisoners and new negotiations on terms for disarming the rebel army.

Nicaragua’s Sandinista rulers also agreed to grant “unrestricted press freedom” and amnesty for political exiles.

Rebel leaders will be allowed to take other political demands, such as abolishing the military draft, to a “national dialogue” between the government and civic opposition parties.

10-Point Accord Signed

Defense Minister Humberto Ortega and three top rebel leaders signed the 10-point accord in a truck inspection shed at this southern border post after three days of face-to-face negotiations.

“We have taken the first firm step toward ending this fratricidal war,” Contra leader Adolfo Calero said. “It is a sincere accord, a viable accord that can and must be fulfilled for the good of our country and all of Central America.”

President Daniel Ortega, who drove to the border to watch the signing, called it “a historic event” that points to “a glorious future” for this country of 3 million people.

At least 50,000 Nicaraguans have died in a decade of political strife that began with the 1978-79 Sandinista insurrection and continued through six years of war between the Soviet-backed revolutionary government and U.S.-financed rebels. More than 25,000 have died in the Contra war.

“This is the hour for Nicaraguans to construct our own destiny,” the president said. “Nicaraguans have taken the first step. I invite President Reagan to subscribe to this peace effort.”

Follows Contra Aid Cutoff

The agreement came 23 days after the cutoff of the rebels’ U.S. assistance by a Feb. 3 vote in Congress and a week after Sandinista forces disrupted their main overland supply line with a major offensive along the Honduran border.

The agreement amounted to a conciliatory effort on points offered by both sides at the start of the talks.

Calero acknowledged that the U.S. aid cutoff had weakened the position of his 10,000-man guerrilla insurgency against the 85,000-man Sandinista army.

“The Congress of the United States has not helped us,” Calero had told reporters Tuesday. “We are here alone.”

Cease-Fire Zones

Under the accord, rebel forces will have 15 days, starting April 1, to enter cease-fire zones that will be drawn in negotiations starting next week to separate them from the Sandinista army.

The rebels agreed not to solicit any more aid from the United States. Under the agreement, they could receive non-lethal assistance, but it must be delivered by a neutral agency acceptable to both sides.

The government pledged to free on Sunday 100 of the 1,523 political prisoners it says it is holding on charges of aiding the Contra cause. Half the rest are to be freed after rebel troops enter the truce zones.

Ex-Guardsmen to Be Freed

The remaining suspected Contra prisoners and most of the 1,837 former members of the National Guard will be freed after the signing of a definitive cease-fire accord with a fixed date for the Contras’ disarmament.

Former President Anastasio Somoza’s National Guard was defeated in the 1979 Sandinista insurrection. The agreement calls for the release of all those imprisoned guardsmen whom the Inter-American Human Rights Commission determines did not commit atrocities against civilians.

The movement of rebels into truce zones will also permit their exiled civilian leaders to enter Nicaragua and join the “national dialogue” already under way.

Negotiations on those troops’ disarmament are to begin April 6 in Managua.

‘Total Political Pluralism’

Rebel leaders said they would demand in those talks that the Sandinistas show full compliance with the preliminary truce agreement and other elements of a Central American peace accord they signed last August. It calls for “total political pluralism” in the region to end its guerrilla wars.

Alfredo Cesar, another Contra leader, sought to assure rebel troops in the field that they would not be betrayed.

“To our heroic combatants, I say you have helped us achieve this historic agreement, and you will be the guarantors that it is fulfilled.”

Read by Head of OAS

Sandinista and Contra negotiators stood solemn-faced on a platform as the national anthem was played and Joao Baena Soares, secretary general of the Organization of American States, read their agreement.

Standing beside Baena was Cardinal Miguel Obando y Bravo, who had mediated all four previous cease-fire negotiations since December.

“Thank God for illuminating the search for peace,” he intoned in a benediction of the event. “Only united can Nicaraguans rebuild our country.”

Obando and Soares, who served as witnesses to the talks here, will supervise all aspects of the agreement.

Both sides had opened the talks here Monday by declaring unilateral truces for as long as the talks here lasted.

Unlike the formal cessation of hostilities being negotiated here, the truce negotiated here is a matter of honor. There is no provision for its enforcement by neutral observers.

Violation Charged

The official Voice of Nicaragua radio reported that a Contra patrol violated the truce Tuesday by attacking a Sandinista army truck in Matagalpa. Two government soldiers and one rebel were reported killed.

Bosco Matamoros, a rebel spokesman here, said he did not know about the incident. He said “isolated attacks” were inevitable until all Contra troops were informed of the truce.

In Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Contra sources and government officials said about 300 Sandinista soldiers crossed into that country Tuesday for the second time in two weeks and battled rebels based near the border. There was no confirmation of the report here, and the Nicaraguan government denied it. (Story on Page 16.)

Even before the agreement, this round of peace talks had been hailed by both sides as the most promising of five meetings held since last December. Besides being the first inside Nicaragua, it was the highest-level meeting between the two sides.

One participant said the discussion here ranged far beyond the rival cease-fire proposals into an intense philosophical debate on the nature of the 8 1/2-year-old Sandinista revolution and the meaning of democracy in a country with little experience in practicing it.

‘Errors’ Admitted

Nicaragua’s defense minister, Gen. Ortega, the participant said, pleaded with the Contras’ civilian leaders and field commanders seated across from him to stop judging the revolution by their memories of the early 1980s, when what he admitted were Sandinista “errors” drove them into exile or guerrilla hide-outs in the hills.

The general, one of nine all-powerful comandantes of the Sandinista Directorate, insisted that times have changed in Nicaragua since last August, when the government signed a regional peace accord requiring “total political pluralism,” the informant said.

Contra leaders, in turn, said they sought and won assurances that the Sandinistas were interested in giving them and their conservative cause a fair hearing in civilian political life, with full constitutional guarantees.

Progress Seen

“We’ve made a lot of progress toward a deeper understanding of each other, toward overcoming years of animosity and distrust,” said one negotiator earlier Wednesday. “At least we have a verbal cease-fire.”

The positive tenor in which both sides described the talks contrasted with the ferocity of last week’s fighting between Sandinista forces and rebel troops near the Contras’ main base camps along the Honduran border.

It was also at odds with Sandinista-led demonstrations elsewhere in Nicaragua calling for the surrender of the Contras or their military defeat.

In the talks and in public here, Gen. Ortega refrained from his habitual characterization of the Contras as “mercenaries” of Washington.

Asked Tuesday how he felt shaking the hand of Calero, a member of the Contra leadership, Ortega said: “We didn’t come here to resolve personal problems. More important than extending my hand is reaching a peace agreement. If we do that, other people will applaud.”

Calero, asked how he felt sitting down with Ortega, remarked: “I am surprised. There is so little antagonism.”

Times staff writer William R. Long in Managua contributed to this article.