Back in February, weeks before NATO launched its Libyan bombing campaign but after the Tripoli regime had slaughtered hundreds of civilians, Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega phoned Muammar Qaddafi multiple times to express his support. Speaking publicly, Ortega declared that the bloodstained despot was “waging a great battle.” Then, in late March, with the NATO war well underway, Qaddafi tapped former Nicaraguan foreign minister Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann (who served under Ortega’s Sandinista dictatorship during the 1980s) to be Libya’s new ambassador to the United Nations.
So it wasn’t terribly surprising last month when WikiLeaks released a pair of U.S. diplomatic cables speculating that “Libyan monies have maintained Ortega for years,” that “Ortega’s national and popular council model is based on the Libyan ‘Green Book,’” and that Qaddafi’s nephew (Muhamad Muhktar Lashtar) is employed as Ortega’s personal secretary.
