Nicaraguan Soldiers Leave Border Area

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras--Nicaragua withdrew its soldiers from the Honduran border yesterday and declared an end to fighting while it holds true talks with Contra rebels, according to reports from all sides.

The border region remained tense, with Honduran patrols on the lookout for any booby traps left behind by the Sandinistas.

President Jose Azcona Hoyo said the 32000 U.S. troops sent to Honduras last week, after the Nicaraguan army was accused of sending 2000 men across the border last Wednesday in pursuit of Contras, may not be needed any longer.

"The worst is over, and there is peace now in the border region," Col. Reynald Andino Flores, commander of the Honduran army's 101st Infantry Brigade, said by telephone from his headquarters in southern Honduras.

"We are remaining on a state of alert to be ready for anything that may happen," he added, and soldiers are "constantly patrolling the area."

Flores and other officers, some of whom insisted on anonymity for security reasons, said the Sandinistas penetrated an area of about 20 square miles inside Olancho province last week while chasing the U.S.-supported rebels in a two-week offensive to evict the Contras from Nicaragua.

About 200 border incidents have been reported in Olancho since the Contras began fighting the leftist Sandinista government in 1981.

President Daniel Ortega and the Nicaraguan government have denied that Sandinista soldiers crossed the border.

The Contras maintain camps in an area called Bocay, which includes territory on both sides of the border. Nicaragua claims the camps, which the Contras use to store supplies and to stage raids inside Nicaragua, are in Nicaraguan land but the rebels say they are in Honduras.

Sapoa

At Sapoa, a town on the Costa Rican border, representatives of the Sandinista government and Contras began their first direct talks yesterday on Nicaraguan soil.

The purpose of the negotiations is to work out a cease-fire as required by the peace plan that five Central American presidents signed last Aug. 7.

Defense Minister Humberto Ortega of Nicaragua said the Sandinistas would stop fighting during the talks, which are scheduled to last three days, and asked the Contras to do the same.

Contra leader Alfredo Cesar, head of the rebel delegation, called the Sandinista proposal "constructive," and added, "If they do this, then we also can take the same measures."

Sending four battalions of the 82nd Airborne Division and 7th Light Infantry to Honduras brought the U.S. military presence in Honduras to more than 6000 men. They are engaged in joint exercises with the Hondurans but away from the border combat area.

U.S. and Honduran units have held joint exercise every few months for the last five years.

Some of the American troops practiced military maneuvers at an airstrip only 20 miles from the Nicaraguan border on Sunday.

In Washington, the focus turned to a renewed debate over U.S. aid to the Contras. The Reagan administration indicated support for a new $48 million proposal advanced by a bipartisan group of senators.

It would include funds to pay for delivery of up to $2.5 million in previously authorized military aid.