"Time to End"

Chased out of Nicaragua by his niece's husband, General Anastasio Somoza, and Somoza's U. S.-trained National Guard (TIME, June 15), Nicaragua's legal President Dr. Juan Bautista Sacasa last week found an attitude of hurt dignity his only recourse in his sanctuary in San Salvador. "The military coup of a reprehensible character," said he, "was executed by the abuse of my confidence. . . . I must confess frankly that because of the repeated protests by Somoza of his loyalty, his prospects and his connection with my family [technically making Somoza ineligible for the Presidency, under Nicaraguan law], I never believed he would go to the extreme of raising the flag of rebellion. . . . In spite of the grave deception I suffered I continue life with my head up. . . ."

In Nicaragua's capital of Managua, Deceiver Somoza had Congress elect to the Provisional Presidency a man of his choosing, Dr. Carlos Brenes Jarquin, 52, had himself nominated by the Liberal Party to run in the regular autumn election.

Meanwhile a discordant voice sounded from Mexico, whose history is speckled with de facto Governments set up by military rebellion. Last week Mexico's Leftist Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM) asked President Lazaro Cardenas to refuse Somoza's de facto Government Mexican recognition. "It is time," the Confederation sanctimoniously declared, "to do something to end military rebellions in Latin America." This put President Cardenas in a ticklish spot. Latin American nations have repeatedly charged that the U. S.'s occasional refusal to recognize Latin-American revolutionary Governments was in effect a kind of intervention. Under Mexico's Estrada Doctrine (named for Mexico's onetime Foreign Minister), which provides that any Government, no matter how set up, is to be recognized, President Cardenas has already recognized two de facto Governments in Paraguay and Bolivia. Last week he called home from Nicaragua Mexico's Charge d'Affaires Octavio Reyes Spindola, "to report on recent events."

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