NICARAGUA'S CASE AGAINST US IN WORLD COURT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740039-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 25, 2010
• Sequence Number: 39
• Publication Date: September 18, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/29: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740039-9
R ^TtCLE APPEARED
ON PA~~ l CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
18 September 1985
Nxaragua's case armin
US in World Court
Even if Sandinistas Win, Cc ngrt ss unlikely to alter US policy
By Gangs Q. Moih a NI
Staff writer of The Christian Science Monl cr
waftobw
Nicaragua may stand to win public tions points abroad in its case against the-
United States at the World Court.
But despite allegations that the US is seek-
ing to overthrow the Sandinista government,
the case is not likely to have much effect
where Nicaragua needs it most - in the US
Caries. Sources on Capitol Hill sad that
faced with South Africa, trade, and the com-
ing superpower summit, congressional inter.
est in Latin America, for now at least, has
taken a sharp downturn.
Nicaragua resumed its legal offs-naive
against the US last week, charging the US
with "state terrorism" in providing aid and or-
ganizational advice to antigovernment rebels,
or "contras," operating from bases in Hondu-
ras and Costa Rica.
In testimony yesterday, a French Roman Catholic
priest who taught ruining at a school near the Honduran
border said that the contras have created an "atmo-
sphere of terror" in northern Nicaragua and graphically
described alleged attacks against women and children.
Nicaragua's legal team, headed by Harvard law
Prof.Abram Chayes, is seeking hundreds of millions of
dollars in compensation for lives and property lost in
contra attacks during the past four years.
But responding from Washington, Reagan adminis-
tration officials cite what they call a mountain of new evi-
dence confirming longstanding charges that Nicaragua
has been exporting its revolution.
In a controversial move last January, the administra-
tion announced its refusal to participate directly in the
case, saying the issue at stake was "political" and not
"legal," and charging that Nicaragua was using the court
- known officially as the International Court of Justice
- for "political and propaganda purposes." The decision
was widely criticized as a challenge to the principle of the
rule of law in international affairs.
Responding to Nicaragua's charges before the World
Court, administration spokesmen say US support for the
contras was taken in legitimate self-defense in response
to documented efforts by the Nicaraguan government to
support and train leftist guerrillas operating in neighbor-
ing Central American countries.
Last week, the administration released a report it says
contains new evidence to back up its claims. The 130-
page document, which administration spokesmen ac-
knowledge was timed to rebut Nicaragua's case before
the tribunal in The Hague, cites what it calls "sustained
[Nicaraguan] efforts to overthrow or intimidate other
governments" through the arming and training of leftist
forces and the transshipment of Soviet and Cuban arms.
The report is based an newly released intelli~ooe in-
formatinn_ captured documents, and the testimony of
guerrilla defectors from El Salvador.
The report says that faced with mounting evidence
that Nicaragua was seeking to export its revolution, the
US was gradually forced to replace its "positive relation-
ship" with Nicaragua with a policy of providing direct
assistance to contra forces. Such support, the report
says, is not "the action of one government determined to
destroy another," but rather an effort to "persuade an
aggrtiseor government to cease its unlawful acts in tli ,
tereet of regional peace and security"
But lawyers for Nicaragua contend that overthrowing
the Sandinista government is precisely the aim of US
policy j2rrner
-um
Rdga Chamorro testified that Central In-
iy ADUM told him that nnub 115 state.
aid was intended only to
flow of arms across the Nicaraguan border were Man
fly "to maintain the support of and should
not be taken seriously by us; says, the real
objective "[as we were repeatedly told in private], was to
overthrow the government of Nicaragua.".
1.500 armaed rebels.
s
, President rovided the
money and advice that translated various sinsill r-
NNiCiM , Such activities, they say. m vio-
lation of international law which forbids the threat or
use of force against another state except in case of war.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/29: CIA-RDP91-00587R000200740039-9