REVIEW OF WHITE HOUSE DIGEST DRAFT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP86M00886R001500010038-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 26, 2008
• Sequence Number: 38
• Publication Date: March 27, 1984
• Content Type: MEMO

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March 27, 1984
MEMORANDUM FOR MR. CHARLES HILL
Executive Secretary
Department of State
COL. JOHN STANFORD
Executive Secretary
Department of Defense
Executive Secretary
Central Intelligence Agency
SUBJECT: Review of White House Digest Draft
0038-7
2185
VIA LDX
Executive Registry l
II-'
Please review the attached White House Digest entitled
"Sandinista Repression of Trade Unions and Employer Groups."
Please provide comments or clearance by Friday, March 30, 1984.
Thank you.
Robert M. immitt
Executive Secretary
Attachment
cc Mr Robert Searby
Deputy Under Secretary-
Dept of Labor
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SANDINISTA REPRESSION OF TRADE UNION
AND EMPLOYER GROUPS
Introduction
It has taken four years of cruel repression for the reality
of human rights violations in Nicaragua to become undeniable.
Nicaraguan officials have admitted to the summary executions of
hundreds of prisoners in the aftermath of the "Triumph."(1)
The Sandinistas have assassinated and kidnapped. their
opponents whether inside or outside of Nicaragua. Examples: the
murders of Commander Bravo in Honduras, Jorge Salazar in Managua,
Hector Frances in Costa Rica Sand Anastasio Somoza in Paraguay.
Repression is not limited to political foes. Nicaraguans
who refuse to bow to Sandinista rule are likely to be harassed,
arrested and, in some cases, tortured. If an individual fails to
conform to Sandinista standards, he will be prohibited from
obtaining employment, food and shelter.
Enforcing this conformity is a vast security network.
Nicaraguans today enjoy few human, civil or political rights.
Free trade union members have been among the most persecuted
groups in Nicaragua since the Sandinista takeover in 1979.
Criticism of Sandinista repression of labor and employer
groups, as it has become more and more heavy-handed, has sparked
concern 'on the part of Amnesty International and the Internation-
al Labor Organization.
Nicaraguan Labor Violations
The International Labor Organization (ILO) has repeatedly
criticized Nicaragua's failure to uphold international freedom of
association standards. A minimum of twelve complaints have been
submitted by both labor and employer organizations against the
Nicaraguan Government since.1980.
The ILO's special committee on Freedom of Association has
concluded in virtually all cases that the murders, arrests and
detentions,-as well as numerous legislative restrictions on civil
and labor rights, violate international standards.
In addition,-the ILO's annual International Labor Conference
has become increasingly adamant in its criticism of Nicaragua's
violation of freedom of association. The 1982 Conference fell
short of public condemnation after the Sandinistas agreed to
cooperate and seek assistance from the ILO.
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When the Conference convened in June, 1983, however, no
assistance had actually been sought. The Conference subsequently
publicly highlighted for the first time the case of Nicaragua,
and under much pressure, the government requested formal assis-
tance from the ILO. The ILO mission was to have visited Nicar-
agua in December, 1983,-and its findings are to be discussed at
the next ILO Conference in June, 1984. (2)
The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU),
officially protested to the Nicaraguan-government on December 18,
1981, concerning restrictions placed on the attendance at a union
training course-given by the International Center for Advanced-
Vocational Training in Turin, Italy.
One candidate was selected from the government-controlled
Sandinista Confederation of Nicaraguan Workers (CST), and one
from the Confederation of Trade Union Unity (CUS), an independent
free trade union. The CST candidate was approved, but the
Nicaraguan government denied permission to the representative of
the CUS.
The government dismissed the incident as a bureaucratic
mistake -- the candidates had not cleared exit permits with the
Ministry of Planning, they said -- and neither candidate went.(3)
Since the creation of the Sandinista-controlled union, CUS
has come under attack, and its members have been repeatedly
harassed. Members of the CST have been rewarded for their
loyalty. As a result it is increasingly difficult for the
independent CUS to survive as a free trade union. (4)
As estimated 200 members of the Central de Trabajadores de
Nicaragua (CTN), a trade union federation affiliated with the
Christian Democratic Confederacion Latinoamericana de Trabaja-
dores (CLAT), were reported detained for questioning between
June, 1981 and December, 1982. -
Some trade union leaders have in a number of cases been
repeatedly detained. Juan Rafael Suazo, president of the union
of workers at Managua cooking oil factories (Sindicato de la
Industria Aceitera de Managua, or SITRIAM), an affiliate of the
CTN, was detained for several days in March, 1982 and again in
April, 1982.
The charges were not brought before a court and this, in
itself justifies questioning whether the arrests represent a_
patter-n of harassment or intimidation.
On November 7, 1982, Alejandro Amero and Dennis Maltes Lugo,
social welfare secretary and treasurer respectively of the
dockworkers' union of the Pacific Coast of Corinto (Sindicato de
Estibadores del Puerto de Corinto), were detained on unspecified
charges under Public Order Law, (Decree no. 5 of July 20, 1979).
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Alejandro Amero was held in detention for a two week period,
following which he was released. At the time of his release, the
case was still in the interrogation stage.
Dennis Maltes Lugo was detained for a period of five weeks
following which charges. were dropped and he was subsequently
released. Other members of the Dockworkers' Union, who have
reportedly been detained for short periods of time, have, in the
past, been the subject of repeated appeals by Amnesty Interna-
tional. (5) The ICFTU also issued a statement calling for the'
release of the imprisoned dock workers.
On May 5, 1983, 18 individuals, most of them leaders of the
CTN, were detained. While little information is available in the
legal situation of the 18 prisoners, all were reportedly detained
under the Law for the Maintenance of Public Order and Security;
some were reportedly charged under this law with having sabotaged
or obstructed production in their work places.
Amnesty is concerned that the 18 may have been detained
solely because of their leadership positions in the national
trade federation, the CTN. Although some are believed to have
been released, those still-in detention have been charged under
Public Order Law for various crimes,_ among them sabotage and
obstructing production.(6)
Few cases of convictions and lengthy sentences under Public
Order Law clauses restricting the freedom of expression, trade
union organization, and the non-violent activities of political
parties have come to the attention of Amnesty international or
other human rights organizations in the course of 1982.
Most prisoners detained in relation to trade union, politi-
cal party, or other activity not involving violence or the
advocacy of violence have been held for relatively short periods,
and released before trial proceedings have begun.
In this regard, however, Amnesty International is concerned
at what appears to be a pattern of harassment and intimidation
through short-term, but arbitrary imprisonment of supporters of
lawful opposition, trade union, and other groups.(7)
Some of these arrests are-clearly arbitrary. The pattern of
these arrests appears to represent a practice intended to intimi-
date members or potential members or supporters of independent
trade unions, political parties, or other non-violent organiza-
tions that are considered a potential challenge to current
government policies.
Throughout 1982 and continuing through mid-1983, members of
organizations that have challenged government policies have been
subject to frequent short-term arrest and routine questioning in
a pattern of apparent harassment and intimidation. (8)
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One particularly disturbing example of harassment was a
recent Barricada (the official Sandinista newspaper) article
labeling Alvin Guthrie, the leader of an independent labor
confederation, a "counterrevolutionary." With the story was a
cartoon, drawn by a state cartoonist, depicting Guthrie, who is
black, with a bone tied.to the top of his head. (9)
On a recent visit to the U.S., Victor Espinoza, Legal
Counsel to the CTN, stated that the CTN wants Nicaragua to return
to the three promised components of the original Sandinista plan:
political pluralism, a mixed economy, and non-alignment with any
superpower. Since this has not been done, however, the CTN has-
refused to join the official Sandinista government labor organi-
zation.
CTN leaders say that as a result, members of their union are
the first to be fired by state-owned companies, are frequently
harassed, and arbitrarily arrested. Close to thirty of their
members are currently in prison. (10)
Surrender to the State
In Communist countries throughout the world, trade unions
serve not to advance the interests of the workers, but to serve
the political interests of the rulers. They serve not to organ-
ize strikes but to forbid them; not to improve the wages and
benefits but to restrain them; not to bargain collectively on
behalf of the workers but to organize the collective submission
of the workers to their employers -- the State.
This same path is being pursued by the new Communist leader-
ship of Nicaragua. The primary purpose of labor unions in
today's Nicaragua is to assist in the forced transformation of
society along the lines determined by the Sandinista leadership.
Sandinista violations of workers' rights even includes
requiring workers to participate in all-night work details,
according to Benjamin Lanz-as, a leader of the Superior Council of
Private Enterprise (COSEP). He said:
"After working all day the people are 'volunteered' for
special midnight to 5 a.m. neighborhood work details. If
they refuse, they are hounded by the turbas, or mobs,
organized by the neighborhood Sandinist spies, the CDS
(Comites de Defensa Sandinista). These turbas then
terrorize the worker's family, destroy the worker's
property, and the worker is often denied his food ration
card unless he is willing to repent." (11).
Existing independent trade unions are being harassed, their
members blacklisted, threatened and sometimes jailed. Most of
the unions and most of the union members in the country have been
herded into Sandinista labor confederations subservient to the
government.
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These confederations have supported the Nicaraguan govern-
ment's ban on strikes, collaborating in the destruction of
organized labor's most potent weapon. Collective-bargaining has
become a- farce. (12)
The AIFLD Episode: 1979-1981
Soon after their takeover of Nicaragua in 1979, the FSLN
became increasingly critical of the American Institute for Free
Labor Development (AIFLD) presence in Nicaragua and of democratic
unions such as the CUS, an affiliate of the International Confed-
eration of Free Trade Unions.
It publicized in the press (various articles-in Barricada)
that the AIFLD operation was a CIA front, whose employees were
posing as trade unionists while seeking to undermine the revolu-
tion. Sandinista efforts to discredit AIFLD personnel and
programs, as well as threats against the CUS leaders eventually
culminated in the closing of the AIFLD office. Much of the CUS
leadership is now in exile.
The CUS and other democratic unions continue to be harassed
to this day. The AIFLD office and its personnel in Managua were
under constant surveillance; telephones were tapped; and occa-
sional, illegal searches and break-ins were carried out after
hours at the AIFLD office. Equipment and documents were stolen
during the break-ins and the contents of the documents were later
printed in Barricada.
The AIFLD had,established a revolving fund for campesino
seminars from which the campesinos could receive a no-interest
loan for their planting season to be repaid at harvest time.
After the loans were made, the Sandinistas threatened the borrow-
er not to repay, and eventually the revolving fund was bankrupt.
In addition to public harassment directed at AIFLD and other
democratic unions, the Sandinistas enlisted the support of their
newly-created government labor federation, the CST. The CST is
affiliated to the Communist World Federation of Trade Unions
(WFTU), an organization headed by the iron curtain countries and
Cuba, headquartered in Prague.
This was followed by a Sandinista order preventing the AIFLD
country director from physically operating out of his office. In
addition to isolating him from his staff, his passport was also
confiscated-for a period of approximately three months. Exit and
entry visas were denied to prohibit his travel to regional labor
meetings and-to the U.S.
For a period of approximately six months, the AIFLD director
had to conduct his duties under the protection of the U.S.
Embassy in Managua. Unable to effectively carry out a program of
training and agricultural development for campesino unions, the
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AIFLD director was withdrawn and the office was finally closed in
1981.
The official repression carried out in the press, and
through Sandinista trade unions affiliated with the CST, fore-
closed U.S. opportunities to cooperate with democratic unions in
Nicaragua. At no time Were any charges against AIFLD proven, nor
was the Sandinista campaign of harassment ever embraced by the
CUS or other democratic unions familiar with the AIFLD program in
Nicaragua. -
A personal appeal to Sandinista leaders by the AIFLD
director to discuss the aims and objectives of the AIFLD union-
to-union program in Nicaragua went unanswered. The Sandinista
efforts to discredit-AIFLD/U.S. forms of technical assistance on
a union-to-union basis in Nicaragua were nothing more than a
pretext for hostile actions against the U.S.
Moreover, these actions were inconsistent with the claimed
Sandinista policy of promoting free and democratic institutions
in the aftermath of the Somoza rule. Further evidence of their
actual policy of opposition to free unions is seen in the Sandin-
ista persecution of the Nicaraguan Workers-Central, a non-
Sandinista labor confederation, supported by the World Confed-
eration of Labor (made up of European Christian trade unions) and
its regional organization, CLAT.
Repression of the Business Sector
Nicaragua's private sector, organized under an umbrella
organization known as the Superior Council for Private Enterprise
(COSEP), has frequently complained that the radical policies
pursued by the Sandinistas have created a lack of confidence in
the country's political and economic future, elements vital for,
private investment.
For such criticism, members of the Nicaraguan business
community, who played an essential role in overthrowing Somoza's
goverrimeut through its "crippling strikes," have been portrayed
as 0counterrevolutionaries," exploiting the masses. Because of
this, they have been persecuted by the Sandinista security
forces.
This persecution includes the assassination of the vice
president of COSEP, Jorge Salazar, who was shot to death by
government security forces minutes after a staged "arms trans-
fer." The government justified the - murder by calling him a-
"counterrevolutionary." -
Since this incident, thousands of businessmen, technicians,
and professionals have fled from Nicaragua. Understandably,
businesses have suffered dramatic decreases in productivity. (13)
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On October 20, 1981, COSEP published an open letter criti-
cizing Humberto Ortega's statement that the Sandinista government
could "in a matter of hours," take over everything that "the
bourgeoisie still possesses." The letter accused the government
of egregious economic mismanagement, and the Sandinista doctrine
of Marxism-Leninism, for the country's deepening economic crisis.
(14)
The Sandinista government quickly reacted to this letter: by
midnight of the same day, state security forces arrested four
COSEP leaders in their homes for "violation of the economic and
social emergency law."
Three of those arrested were sentenced to seven months in
jail on October 30. They were Enrique Dreyfus, President of
COSEP, Benjamin Lanzas, President of the Chamber of Construction,
and Gilberto Cuadra, President of the Federation of Nicaraguan
Professionals.
Similar sentences were handed down to three other business-
men who fled into exile in Venezuela and the U.S. This left the
private sector in Nicaragua leaderless, and with few anti-
Sandinistas willing to assume such a risky role. Under continued
international pressure, the Sandinistas finally released the
COSEP leaders on February 14. Daniel Ortega called together 250
business executives to announce that the sentences had been
commuted. (15)
In February and October 1982, the International Organization
of Employers (IOE), filed complaints charging the government of
Nicaragua detained Enrique Bolanos Gayer, acting Chairman of
COSEP, to prevent his participation in a joint economic forum
between the governments of Nicaragua and Venezuela.
Also restricted or detained were Enrique Dreyfus, Ismael
Reyes, Vice-Chairman of COSEP, William Baez, Assistant Director
of the Nicaraguan Development Institute, Rosendo Diaz, Executive
Secretary of the Union of Agricultural Producers, and Alejandro -
Burgos, Executive Director of COSEP.(1j6)
_The Nicaraguan government denied the charges and Dreyfus and
his associates were later arrested. Many labor and private
enterprise-representatives are now in exile, due-to restrictions
by the Sandinista regime. (17)
The Sandinista regime continued its repressive tactics
against COSEP's representation of the private sector in Nicar-
agua. The "Sandinistas agreed only reluctantly to free employer
representation at the International Labor Conference of the ILO,
where- employers, workers and governments meet to formulate new
labor standards and to review labor rights violations. (18)
Following pressure from the International Organization of
Employers, the Sandinista government finally permitted Ismael
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Reyes to attend the 1983 ILO Conference. However, once at the
Conference, Reyes learned that his son had been arrested by State
Security agents and that two of his businesses had been confis-
cated by the government during his absence.
Reyes left the Conference without being able to participate
in key discussions on Nicaragua's violation of international
labor standards. Some speculated that the Sandinista government
learned that Reyes planned to speak out against the government's
violation of freedom of association and therefore, retaliated by
arresting Reyes' son and confiscating his businesses. (19)
Mechanisms of Control and Repression
Under the law for the Maintenance of Public Order and
Security (Decree No.__ 5 of July 20, 1979), a wide range of of-
fenses allegedly related to national security are punishable by
imprisonment. (20)
On March 15, 1982, a State of Emergency was declared in
Nicaragua and some civil rights and guarantees were suspended.
The State of Emergency, equivalent to a state of siege, replaced
the State of Economic and Social Emergency that had been in force
since September 9, 1981, and made punishable. acts considered to
undermine the national economy, elaborating on provisions to that
effect al-ready included in the Public Order Law.
Under the September 9, 1981 measure, the right to strike had
been suspended and dissemination considered damaging to the
economy had been made punishable by imprisonment. The March,
1982 State of Emergency retained these provisions and among other
measures, ordered a halt to certain activities of political
parties and provided for prior censorship of the news media.
Under the State of Economic Emergency, censorship had been
exercised through the threat of imprisonment of persons respons-
ible for the publication or broadcasting of news or information
considered damaging to the economy and the threat of closure of
the newspaper or radio station in question. (21)
There has been apparently systematic censorship from the
news media of material concerning human rights issues inside
Nicaragua, including reports produced by domestic Nicaraguan
human rights, church, trade union, or political organizations
regarding human rights abuses.
Some of the prisoners detained under the Public Order.Law,
both before and after the declaration of the State of Emergency,
have been prosecuted solely as a result of their active member-
ship in lawful trade unions or business associations, in human
rights groups, or in' political party organizations in conflict
with or critical of the government. (22)
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Conclusion
Human rights abuses, including persecution of trade union
and business groups by the Sandinista regime, are.clearly arbi-
trary. The pattern of arrests appears to represent a practice
intended to intimidate members or potential members or supporters
in independent trade unions,. political parties, or other non-
violent organizations that are considered to challenge current
government policies.
The Sandinista Revolution, while originally promising to
bring all Nicaraguans into a pluralistic society has, in fact,
singled out these same pluralistic institutions such as trade
union and employer groups, and subjected them to the controls of
a police state.. _
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Footnotes
1. New York Times, March 5, 1981 p. 2A
2. Bureau of International Labor Affairs, January, 1984
3. Richard Araujo, "The Sandinista War on Human
Rights," Heritage Foundation Backgrounder, no. 277 July 19, 1983
4. Ibid.
5. Statement by Amnesty International before the
Subcommittee on Human Rights and International Organizations,
U.S. House of Representatives, September 15, 1583 pp. 4-6
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. Chris Hedges, "To get ahead in Nicaragua, be a
Sandinista," Christian Science Monitor November 25, 1983 p. 11
10. Victor Espinoza, interview with the Voice of
America December 8, 1983
11. David Assman, "Are Sandinist Changes for Real?" The
Wall Street Journal, December 9, 1983 p. 30`
12. The Permanent Committee for Nicaraguan Human
Rights: "A Union Report on Nicaragua"
13. "The Sandinista war," op. cit.
14. Richard Araujo, "The Nicaraguan Connection: A
Threat to Central America," Heritage Foundation Backgrounder no.
168, February 24, 1982 _
15. Ibid.
16. "The Sandinista war," op. cit.
17. Ibid.
18. Bureau of International Labor Affairs, January,1984
20. Amnesty International, op. cit.
21. Ibid.
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