by Rod Hughes
Costa Rican President Oscar Arias and his Nicaraguan counterpart Daniel Ortega are due to have a private chat today in Managua and both countries are watching closely to see if the sparks fly as they have in recent months when they have exchanged barbs in separate statements.
New Costa Rican ambassador to Nicaragua, Antonio Tacsan, describes the agenda as “unpredictable,” as is the outcome. “The agenda is open and we hope the conversation will turn out to be friendly,” Tacsan added, a comment that may have been made with crossed fingers.
Arias, understandably proud of his 1987 Nobel Peace Prize for ending the Central American civil wars that had cost thousands of lives, is touchy that Ortega has said that Arias does not merit the honor and that the real peacemaker at the time was Vinicio Cerezo, the Guatemalan president at the time the peace accords were signed.
Ortega has been stung by Arias’s remarks criticizing Ortega’s close ties with Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and, by inference, to Fidel Castro, as well. Ortega also has accused Arias of being used by the United States to “conspire” against Nicaragua.
The occasion that finds the two presidents in the same city is the conference organized by Cardinal Obando y Bravo at Nicaragua’s Universidad Catolica to celebrate peace in the region.
Arias made his journey in the company of his foreign minister, Bruno Stagno, and the new bishop of Alajuela, Msr. Angel Sancasimiro. Two weeks ago, Ortega was significantly absent from a similar celebration of 20 years of peace, pleading an agenda conflict.
In the press conference that announced the bilateral talks, Samuel Santos, Nicaragua’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, denied that friction exists between the two although admitting that there were certain “differences of opinion.” But that is what diplomats are supposed to say, even when their bosses are throwing rocks at each other…