WORLD : 1,900 Somoza Ex-Guardsmen Freed
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MANAGUA, Nicaragua — Almost 1,900 members of former dictator Anastasio Somoza’s national guard were pardoned today in the biggest prisoner release in the nation’s history.
The pardon fulfilled one of Nicaragua’s commitments under a Central American peace accord signed in El Salvador last month. “To give effect to the El Salvador accord it is necessary to grant a pardon to the ex-guardsmen who were justly imprisoned for crimes against the Nicaraguan people,” said a presidential pardon read by Information Minister Manuel Espinoza at a ceremony in Managua’s Tipitapa Prison.
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