A high ranking Central Intelligence Agency official indicated today that he discounted reports that the Palestine Liberation Organization has sent advisors to help the Sandinista government in Nicaragua.
Adm. Bobby Inman, deputy director of the CIA, said in response to questions at a briefing for reporters at the State Department, that there was a build-up of Nicaraguan forces beyond that country’s defense needs. He noted that there have been reports of PLO advisors in Nicaragua.
With respect to those reports, he said it is “not clear to me “whether the PLO advisors were helping to build the Nicaraguan force which could only be a threat to neighboring countries, or if the PLO was training Nicaraguans for the “export of revolution.” But Inman conceded that these reports, which he said were several months old, have never been “confirmed with a degree of certainty.” The briefing was confined to the Nicaraguan military build-up and did not deal with the situation in El Salvador. PLO chief Yasir Arafat has boasted that the PLO was helping the guerrillas in El Salvador by flying reconnaissance planes and helicopters.
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