By Xinhua
Managua : Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega did not speak of going to war with the United States in his Sunday speech, a senior Nicaraguan legislator said on Monday.
Edwin Castro, leader of the ruling Sandinista party in the nation’s legislature, said that Nicaragua’s media were deliberately misreporting Ortega’s public support of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s idea of creating joint armed forces for the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA).
Chavez said in his Sunday television and radio show, “Alo Presidente,” that an ALBA armed force could be used against possible aggression in the region either by the U.S. or by an ally, referring to Colombia.
Castro said that Ortega had responded that if an ALBA nation were attacked he would defend that nation, as a show of solidarity.
“Ortega has never spoken of creating a military force to go to war with the United States. That is what Nicaraguan media were misreporting,” said Edwin Castro. He added that he is not backing Chavez’s proposal, but “as Ortega is my friend, if you attack him, then you have also picked a fight with me.”
Also on Monday, Nicaraguan opposition leader Eduardo Montealegre, of the Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance Conservative Party (ALN-PC), called on the two leaders to stop being boastful and to instead work for institutionality, democracy and seeking foreign investment.
Ortega took part in the fourth ALBA summit on Saturday. The other ALBA member nations are Bolivia, Cuba and Venezuela.