U.S. Eases Freeze on Aid to Peru; Nicaragua Funding Under Review

With elections scheduled for October in Peru, the Bush Administration has slightly relaxed its freeze on aid to the government of President Alberto Fujimori, a State Department official said Wednesday.

Fujimori angered Washington and other Western Hemisphere governments April 12 when he suspended the Peruvian Congress, ousted the country’s judges and suspended all political parties.

At the same time, the Administration is reassessing its once-enthusiastic support for Nicaraguan President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro because of congressional complaints that her government has failed to end the influence of the anti-American Sandinista Front, the official said.

U.S. economic aid to Nicaragua, totaling about $150 million a year, is dispersed in installments. Now, about $50 million in aid has been called into question by key Republican lawmakers who say Chamorro has permitted the Sandinistas to retain control over the country’s military and intelligence services.

Although the Peruvian and Nicaraguan developments are not related to each other, they indicate that Washington has eased its initial reaction to Fujimori’s military-backed power grab and has ended its honeymoon with Chamorro, who led an anti-Communist coalition that ousted the Marxist Sandinistas in an election that was hailed at the time as a triumph for U.S. foreign policy.

The bulk of Washington’s $275-million-a-year aid program for Peru remains frozen to protest Fujimori’s crackdown on democratic institutions. But the official said the Administration is ready to increase its financial support for counter-narcotics programs.