Iranians Plant Their Flag In Wilds of Nicaragua

By TODD BENSMAN
Special to the Sun
February 7, 2008


MONKEY POINT, Nicaragua — If the ruling mullahs of the Islamic Republic of Iran were chafing enough about U.S. Navy vessels in the Strait of Hormuz to send speedboats after them last month, they must take some comfort in having projected an equivalent threat in America's own backyard, in this unlikeliest of locales.


The Iranians have planted their flag here in the tree-festooned wilderness of hills that jut out to shelter a vast, unspoiled Caribbean bay on Nicaragua's eastern shore. The point's namesake monkeys swing through the heavy canopy above the smattering of Rama Indians and black Creole people who hunt them and other wildlife for daily sustenance, just as they have for generations. No television or communication informs the Rama and Creole of the internecine goings on in distant Managua, let alone some American beef with Iran half a globe away.


The English-speaking Creole parents of rising heavyweight boxer Evans Quinn, who grew up in a hand-hewn lumber shack, can't even get word of their son's latest fights in Las Vegas or Los Angeles until days after the final bell, when a panga boat pilot might motor in from the sea.


"The life we live here is a poor life," said Sullivan Quinn, whose doorstep is a beach landing where each morning his other sons use machetes to hack Tarpon fish to cooking pot size. "But my son, every time he comes home, he brings everyone shoes. If he keeps winning, he'll do something big and permanent for the whole community, like maybe a gymnasium."


Until recently, one local boxer's fortune was about the only story preoccupying the 300-odd Creole of Monkey Point. But perspectives broadened suddenly in March when Iranians and Venezuelans showed up aboard Nicaraguan military helicopters. They had come to scope out Monkey Point's bay for transformation to a $350 million deep-water shipping port. The port idea is part a new diplomatic relationship between Iran and the Sandinista revolutionary president, Daniel Ortega, that has flown largely under American press and broadcast radar since its August announcement. Iran has since issued fantastic promises that would include financing a rail, road, and pipeline "dry canal" from Monkey Point to an upgraded Port of Corinto on the Pacific, hydroelectric projects, and 10,000 houses in between.


With its latest diplomatic partnership with a time-tested American nemesis, Iran is now just a few porous borders away from President Bush's home state of Texas. All this matters because of fears the Islamic Republic can now project a threat close to America's borders and Mexico's petroleum infrastructure in the event of severe enough sanctions or even war.


I went to Nicaragua recently to see how all this is was playing out, and to take advantage of the fact that no American reporter had yet bothered. A visit made sense because so much has been written about a state sponsor of global terrorism like Iran deepening relations with Venezuela's America-hating president, Hugo Chavez. The only question is whether, in the event of war, Iran could deploy its Hezbollah and Revolutionary Guard agents to hit American interests or allies in South America. It's been done before, under the cover of Iran's embassies, to Jewish targets in Argentina, Americans in Iraq, and perceived enemies elsewhere around the world.