Nicaragua expels six environmental activists accused of handling explosives

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

Nicaragua expels six environmental activists accused of handling explosives

Associated Press in Managua
Tuesday 28 June 2016 21.59 BST

Nicaragua has expelled six foreign environmental activists after they were detained on allegations of handling explosive substances without authorization, a lawyer and the Mexican government said Tuesday.

Mónica López Baltodano, an environmental attorney who has been in contact with authorities since the activists were taken into custody, said four Mexican nationals were deported to Honduras on Monday night and an Argentinian and a Costa Rican were sent to Costa Rica.

Jacobo Prado, a Mexican foreign relations department official, also confirmed the deportation of the four Mexicans in comments to MVS Radio, saying they had been contacted and were in good health.

Nicaraguan authorities have not commented on the reason for the expulsions, but had announced that they would not file charges against the foreigners.

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They were detained Saturday after there was an explosion during a workshop on making low-fuel-consumption ovens in a town in Nueva Guinea, in southern Nicaragua.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/28/nicaragua-expels-environmental-activists-explosives

[Judi Lynn]

1. You really have to wonder why Nicaragua would be jumpy about foreigners with explosives, don't you?

Oh, maybe not.

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Setback for Contras : CIA Mining of Harbors 'a Fiasco'

Last in a series.

March 05, 1985|DOYLE McMANUS and ROBERT C. TOTH | Times Staff Writers

WASHINGTON — When President Reagan's foreign policy advisers urged him to order the CIA to mine Nicaragua's harbors late in 1983, their reasoning was simple: No civilian cargo vessel would dare run such a gantlet, and the cutoff of imported weapons, fuel and other supplies would deal a grievous blow to the Sandinista government.

"We never dreamed that merchant captains would keep sailing in," one of the operation's planners confessed later. "The whole thing was a fiasco."

The mining ploy was intended as a critical boost to the CIA-backed rebels who were launching a major offensive--an offensive some hoped would spark a full-scale uprising against the leftist Sandinistas. Instead, when the mines blew up, so did the Reagan Administration's whole strategy--with consequences that still hobble U.S. policy in Central America.

The "firecracker" mines sowed by CIA-hired commandos working from speedboats were too small to do serious damage to ships, but the outrage they sparked forced Congress to confront squarely the mounting American role in the conflict.

In a few weeks of fury in mid-1984, Congress cut off funding for the anti-Sandinista rebels, known as contras , and the Reagan Administration's war against the leftists--intended as a discreetly "covert" operation--stood with all its flaws exposed.

More:
http://articles.latimes.com/1985-03-05/news/mn-12633_1_harbor-mining