by the El Reportero news services
MANAGUA – Tens of thousands of Nicaraguans were at Plaza de la Fe in Managua Thursday, to celebrate a new anniversary of the Sandinista Revolution, which overthrew dictator Anastasio Somoza on July 19, 1979.
The anniversary’s peculiarity this year is that the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) is in power for the first time in 16 years, thus a massive attendance was expected at the, which will be presided over by President Daniel Ortega.
Regardless of political affiliation, the FSLN return to power on January 10 has generated great expectations among Nicaraguans.
Some of the people’s hopes are beginning to become reality already this July 19, but obviously all expectations are impossible to meet in just six months, asserted Commander Tomás Borge in a statement to Prensa Latina.
The president of Venezuela Hugo Chávez Frías, arrived on Thursday at the International Airport Augusto César Sandino in Managua, in a visit of work to evaluate the advance of the agreements signed with this country.
Chávez’s visit to Nicaraguan, his third one in 2007, coincides with the celebration of the 28th anniversary of the victory of the Sandinista Revolution.
Panamanian President Martín Torrijos Espino also arrived in Nicaragua to take part in the celebrations of July 19, invited by his Nicaraguan counterpart Daniel Ortega.
Honduran President Manuel Zelaya Rosales, who also arrived in Managua to celebrate the anniversary, was in Nicaragua in his early years as a student, as part of a solidarity Honduran group in support of the revolution.
Stolen boy returns home in Guatemala
GUATEMALA CITY – A two-month-old boy who had been stolen from his home was rescued by Guatemalan police, and four people who were allegedly preparing the baby for illegal adoption were arrested.
The rescue comes amid growing concerns about the Central American country’s export of thousands of babies each year to adoptive parents abroad.
It was unclear where the baby was to have been sent, but police detained four people in the house where the baby was rescued and found a false birth certificate for the boy, said Jesus Esquivel, assistant chief of criminal investigations for the police force, adding that their investigations indicate that they were already at the stage of processing the adoption.
However, it was mentioned by Guatemala’s Attorney General’s office, the institution that oversees adoptions, that so far no application for the baby’s adoption, either under his real or false name, had yet been found. The baby could have had another fake birth certificate or the suspects may have not yet filed the application.
The suspects include the owner of the orphanage where the child was found and three employees. The boy was reportedly stolen from his parents’ home in June.
Panama wants to try Noriega on charges
PANAMA CITY, Panama – Despite efforts to send Manuel Antonio Noriega to France, Panama said on Wednesday that it still wants to try the former dictator on homicide charges.
In Miami, Federal prosecutors filed papers Tuesday to have Noriega extradited to France, where he is wanted for allegedly using drug money in transactions including the purchase of Paris apartments, after released from a U.S. drug trafficking sentence in September.
Samuel Lewis, Panamanian Vice President and Foreign Minister, said to press that his government would respect whatever the U.S. courts decide, but that Panama wants Noriega returned home, and denied accusations that his government had arranged for Noriega to be sent to France so President Martin Torrijos could avoid having to jail a member of his party, the Democratic Revolutionary Party.
“We have maintained our request for extradition and will be keeping abreast of the process. This is a legitimate and sovereign decision of the United States.” said Lewis.
Noriega, 71, convicted of protecting Colombian cocaine shipments through Panama into the United States during the 1980s in Florida in 1992, is scheduled to be released Sept. 9 and had intended to fly immediately to Panama to fight a conviction in the slayings of two political opponents. (Prensa Latina and Associated Press contributed to this report.)
