Pope Disputes Stroessner on Ideal Paraguay

Pope John Paul II today sharply disputed Gen. Alfredo Stroessner’s picture of a problem-free Paraguay, saying its people suffer poverty and injustice.

The Pope made his comments a day after the 75-year-old Stroessner told him in a speech at the presidential palace that Paraguay is a virtual social and political paradise.

Stroessner, who has held power since 1954, said Paraguay is “without social and political crises, without tumults, without agitation on the streets, without political prisoners, without hate. . . . “

“Here we do not suffer the plagues of terrorism, hunger or drugs,” Stroessner said.

But the Pope, who had lectured Stroessner on human rights and political ethics Monday night at the presidential palace, said in a speech to priests and nuns this morning that Paraguayans have the same problems as others in the region.

‘All Types of Privations’

“People in Paraguay, as in many other parts of Latin America, suffer all types of privations,” he said to applause.

“Many of them, in fact, lack what is most indispensable to live as human persons and children of God, who wants a dignified existence for all,” he said.

“How many peasants, laborers, workers without jobs or exploited, lack their necessary bread?” he asked.

Apparently renewing his defense of the local church from government criticism that it meddles in politics, the Pope said church men and women have a duty to be closest to the poor.

The Pope’s program at the cathedral here where he addressed the priests and nuns was cut short so he could leave early for a Mass with agricultural workers in Villarica, 100 miles north of Asuncion.