US Offers Nicaragua
Health Aid For Missile
Destruction
(AFP) The United States
has offered Nicaragua
healthcare aid in
exchange for the
destruction of 657
Soviet-made missiles
acquired to fight
US-backed rebels in the
1980s, the US ambassador
said here.
Washington has long
pressured Nicaragua to
destroy the
anti-aircraft missiles
as part of a global
effort to remove old
weapons that could fall
into the hands of
terrorists.
The exchange deal was
prepared "by a team from
the (US) Department of
Defense specialized in
the administration of
hospitals, medicines,
and technical
equipment," who recently
visited the country, and
the Nicaraguan health
ministry, said US
ambassador Paul Trivelli
on a television news
program late Sunday.
It was now up to
Nicaraguan President
Daniel Ortega, who
proposed the
medical-missile exchange
last year, to sign the
deal to hand over 657 of
some 1,000 missiles
still held, Trivelli
said, without detailing
the medical aid.
Ortega has said he would
keep some 400 missiles
for national security
reasons.
The SAM-7 missiles are
remnants of the civil
war between Ortega's
Sandinista National
Liberation Front and
US-backed Contra rebels
in the 1980s.
Former Nicaraguan
president Enrique
Bolanos destroyed 1,000
such missiles in 2004.
Ortega, a former Marxist
guerrilla and Cold
War-era foe of the
United States, was
elected for a second
term in 2006.
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