American Arrested Outside Main Air Base, Nicaragua Says

MANAGUA, Nicaragua — Nicaraguan security forces have arrested an American traveler they said was snooping outside the country’s main air base and suspect him of involvement “in a U.S. plan to attack Nicaragua,” Foreign Minister Miguel d’Escoto announced Saturday night.

The traveler was identified as Sam Nesley Hall, 49, of Dayton, Ohio, and he is being held on suspicion of spying. He was carrying hand-drawn maps pinpointing the locations of the air base, other airports, bridges and other strategic targets inside a sock, D’Escoto said.

“This helps confirm information involving U.S. plans to attack Nicaragua,” D’Escoto told a news conference. “The type of information he was carrying about strategic sites only goes to confirm the seriousness and the imminence of these plans.”

Later, under questioning the foreign minister conceded, “He could be some kind of a nut . . . but he is obviously someone with evil intent toward Nicaragua.”

Hall allegedly was picked up outside the Punta Huete air base, 13 miles northeast of Managua. The field can be used by “advanced performance aircraft,” according to U. S. officials.

D’Escoto said that Hall arrived in Nicaragua on Thursday, checked into a Managua hotel and hired a taxi the next morning to the air base. He was arrested by base officers Friday morning.

According to the foreign minister, Hall first identified himself as a writer but later admitted under questioning to belonging to a private organization he identified as the “Phoenix Battalion.”

D’Escoto said Hall admitted that the “function of that battalion was to carry out espionage and gather military intelligence data of interest to the U. S. government.”

The foreign minister said that Hall arrived from Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, and that his passport shows visas for South Africa, El Salvador and Israel “among other countries.”