Iran, Nicaragua leaders tour slums, share goals

MANAGUA, Jan 15 (Reuters) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a US foe, toured shantytowns with Nicaragua's leftist President Daniel Ortega and said the two countries share common interests and enemies.

On his second trip to Latin America in four months, Ahmadinejad called Ortega, a former Cold War opponent of Washington and part of a growing wave of leftist presidents in the region, a symbol of justice in Nicaragua.

''We have to give each other a hand,'' Ahmadinejad told reporters yesterday. ''We have common interests, common enemies and common goals.'' While distrusted by Washington, oil-exporting Iran's Ahmadinejad is welcomed in many Latin American countries where leftist leaders are trying to reduce US influence.

Ahmadinejad, an ex-soldier, and Ortega, a former Marxist guerrilla, both came to power on populist platforms.

Ortega drove Ahmadinejad on a tour of Managua's poorest slums, past houses made of plastic sheets and Sandinista supporters waving banners and holding up photographs of the Iranian leader.

Ortega, a close ally of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, began his term last week after winning November's election on promises to fight hunger and corruption.

Ahmadinejad is also close to Chavez, a fierce critic of US President George W Bush, and visited him on Saturday before going to Nicaragua later in the evening.

Ahmadinejad took a swipe at Washington after US forces detained five Iranians in Iraq last week, accusing them of links to a group that provides weapons to Iraqi insurgents.

''The United States should look for the root of its problem somewhere else,'' he told a small group of journalists. ''This will not resolve their problems.'' TAKING SIDES Ortega and Ahmadinejad signed agreements to help build affordable housing, dams and other projects in Nicaragua, the Western Hemisphere's second-poorest country after Haiti.

''In our Iranian brothers we have a people, a government, a president willing to join with the Nicaraguan people in the great battle against poverty,'' Ortega said.

Washington accuses Iran of sponsoring terrorism and seeking to build atomic bombs, charges Tehran denies.

Chavez has backed Ahmadinejad in his battle with the international community over Iran's nuclear program, which last month led to limited UN sanctions.

As president of Nicaragua in the 1980s, Ortega and his Sandinista movement confiscated businesses and farms after toppling a US-backed dictator.

Those policies, combined with a US economic blockade and a war against US-supported Contra rebels, plunged the coffee-producing country into chaos.

Since then, Ortega has said he learned his lesson and has dropped Marxism for a center-left program.

The presidents also agreed to reopen their embassies, which had been close since 1990, when Ortega left office.

Following his stop in Nicaragua, Ahmadinejad visits Ecuador, where the presidential race was recently won by Rafael Correa, another critic of US policies.

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