BOMB BLAST KILLS 4 IN NICARAGUA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000504880050-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 15, 2010
• Sequence Number: 50
• Publication Date: June 1, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

-STAT Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/15: CIA-RDP90-00552R000504880050-3
ARTICLE APPEARED
.ON PAGE _Lr
Bomb Blast
''.Kills 4 in
Nicaragua
By John Lantigua
apectal to The WashUWWn Prot
SAN JOSE, Costa Rica, May 31
-A bomb exploded last night dur-
ing a news conference being held by
Nicaraguan rebel leader Eden Pas-
tore along the Nicaraguan-Costa Ri-
can border, wounding Pastora and
two dozen others and killing two
journalists, including one American,
and two rebels.
Among the dead were Linda Fra-
zier, 38, of Portland, Ore., who
worked for the Costa Rican English
daily The Tico Times, and Costa
Rican television cameraman Jorge
Quiros, 26. Officials of Pastors's reb-
el organization, the Revolutionary
Democratic Alliance, said a radio
operator, Rosa Alvarez, had been
killed, and a Red Cross official said a
second rebel died.
No one claimed responsibility for
the blast, which occurred shortly af-
ter Pastora had begun an evening
news conference in his jungle head-
quarters at the Nicaraguan village of
La Penca. The remote village, on the
banks of the San Juan River, is not
reachable by road and the reporters
had traveled by dugout canoe from
Costa Rica.
"It was a very strong explosion,"
said Costa Rican photographer Jose
Antonio Venegas, who said he had
just stepped from the second-floor
room of the wooden building where
the conference was being held. and
was unhurt.
"There was a big hole in the floor
where everyone had been standing
and people were crying, `God help
me. Please help me.'"
:Witnesses said the blast seemed
to come from the middle of the
group of reporters, and there was
speculation that explosives may have
been placed in a piece of luggage and
detonated by remote control. , .
WASHINGTON POST
1 June 1984
[Brooklyn Rivera, one of the lead-
ers of the four organizations making
up The Revolutionary Democratic
Alliance, said the bomb apparently
was hidden in a journalist's tape re-
corder, the Los Angeles Times re-
ported. "We don't have all the evi-
dence of what happened exactly, but
we have information that one of the
pe recorders contained the bomb,"
said. He said the perpetrator is
lieved to have been one of the
alists. "We don't know who it
d be, but we have some suspi-
s," he added.]
An official d the Revolutionary
mocratic Alliance, Adolfo Cha-
rro, called the bombing a "terror-
act" committed "by either the
Atreme left or the extreme right."
Early today, as reports of the
bombing in the remote area reached
lssere, some Costa Rican officials ac-
d Nicaragua's ruling Sandinistas
'
responsibility. Leaders of the reb-
group initially accused the ,C.,
ich has been at odds with Pas-
Chamorro, reached at the San
hospital where Pastora was ta-
sen, said there had been no Sandi-
sta forces in the area of the head-
rs recently. When asked if the
mb might have been planted by a
parate group of anti-Sandinista
bets, the Nicaraguan Democratic
rce, Chamorro said only that an
telligence team of the Revolution-
Democratic Alliance was inves-
ating at the scene.
Although the Costa Rican govern-
ent several months ago banned
astora from the country on grounds
at his group's military activities
mpromised Costa Rican neutrality,
ficials said tonight that the wound-
rebels had been allowed entry for
anitarian reasons.-
In addition to the dead, rebel of-
ficials and Costa Rican Red Cross
and hospital spokesmen said at least
24 persons, most of them journalists,
were being treated for injuries.
Among the most seriously injured
were Nelson Murillo, 23, a Costa
Rican television reporter whose con-
dition was described as grave; Reid
G. Miller of The Associated Press,
and British journalist Susan Morgan,
40, a part-time correspondent for
Newsweek magazine. Officials said
Morgan suffered eye injuries and
fractures in the arms and legs. 's;.
Immediately following the blast,
according to Unite4 Press -Interna-
c ?tional correspondent _ William Ces-
pedes, Pastore, 48, was on his feet
and walking around the jungle com-
pound supervising the lengthy evac-
uation of the wounded. According to
authorities at San Jose's Clinics Bi-
blica hospital, where he was brought
early today, the rebel leader was be-
ing treated for first- and second-de-
gree burns on his upper body and
face, and shrapnel was being re-
moved from his legs.
Over the past year, Pastora' has
been under pressure from the Q&,
and from factions within his own
Costa Rica-based organization,-
known as ARDE, to join forces with
the larger Nicaraguan Democratic
Force, based in Honduras. Both
groups receive funds from the CIA in
their separate guerrilla wars against
the Sandinistas.
A former Sandinista guerrilla
leader, known as Commander Zero
during the successful civil war
against Nicaraguan dictator Anas-
tasio Somoza, Pastore left the San-
dinista government and began to
fight against it on grounds it had
brought the country into alliance
with Cuba.
Although other ARDE leaders had
supported a unity agreement with the
Nicaraguan Democratic Force, Pastore
had rejected it because the other
group's leadership includes , former
members of Somoza's National Guard.
Last week, Pastora said his funding
had been cut off because he refused to
join the Nicaraguan Democratic Force.
Journalists at the news conferencesaid
Pastore had called it to discuss recent
reports that he had withdrawn from
ARDE because its other leaders had
overruled him.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/09/15: CIA-RDP90-00552R000504880050-3