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NICARAGUA: CONTRAS DIVIDED OVER ASKING FOR U.S. AID.

Article Excerpt
Some 300 former Nicaraguan contra commanders have taken a page from the playbook of Guatemala's Patrullas Autodefensas Civiles (PAC) to demand that they and thousands of other ex- contras be compensated for their service in the internal war against the Sandinista government. Rather than ask indemnification of their own government, they decided on Oct. 7 to go directly to the government that solicited their service, that of the US, to pay them.

Salvador Talavera, president of the Partido Resistencia Nicaraguense (PRN), said he sent a letter requesting a "financial-aid package" for 28,000 ex-contras to the US Embassy in Managua. The PRN is a political spinoff of the former contras, many of whom now live in poverty. About 7,000 of them were seriously wounded, and some have been reduced to street-begging for their survival. During the fight against the Sandinista regime (1979-1990), Talavera was known as Comandante Estevan.

The "package" they asked for totals almost US$600 million and will include job training and medical care for the most seriously injured, whose needs are often highly specialized. Jose Angel Talavera, formerly Comandante Chacal and brother of Comandante Estevan, said the request that went to US Ambassador Barbara Moore also includes funding for the...

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