by Rod Hughes
Costa Rican President Oscar Arias and his Nicaraguan counterpart, Daniel Ortega, met yesterday in Managua and, predictably, the atmosphere around the two might have been apt for a snowball fight. As they walked together from the plane that brought Arias, the space between them was so wide TV cameras were forced to pan from side to side to include both of them.
The occasion was a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the peace accords that ended the bloody civil wars in Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador. (See newsfeed article No. 1305)
And as might be expected, Arias and Ortega gave two speeches outlining their memories of the historic event that won Arias the Nobel Peace Prize, each president’s account so different it might have been about two separate events.
Vinicio Cerezo, then Guatemalan president and one of the signers, soothed Aria’s ruffled feathers somewhat by noting diplomatically that Arias “wrote the draft (of the peace pact) and that is that.”
The speaches, when not looking back with fuzzy telescopes, called for a more united Central America to fight poverty. One step forward in Tico-Nica relations was to revive the bilateral commission that was suspended 10 years ago when the controversy about Costa Rican navigation of the San Juan River became tense. Both presidents agreed that the commission’s conversations would not touch that touchy issue, which is now before the International Court at The Hague.
(In a previous account, we erroneously referred to Cerezo as “the late Vinicio Cerezo…” He is very much alive. This writer, who is responsible for the content of this newsfeed, sincerely regrets the error.)