MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- Actor Martin Sheen, at the end of a weeklong stay in Nicaragua, praised the leftist Sandinista government Monday and suggested he and President Reagan sit down and talk about U.S. policy toward the Central American nation.
Sheen, who starred in the movie 'Apocalypse Now!' about the Vietnam War, told a news conference the purpose of his trip to Nicaragua with a Witness for Peace delegation was 'to see for myself.'
'It's been an extraordinary experience,' he said. 'We've talked to many government ministers and people, and it is clear and gratifying that this is a government of the people.'
Sheen said he talked to a group of 'mothers of heroes and martyrs' in the northern city of Matagalpa. Each member of the group has lost at least one child in either the war that overthrew the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza in 1979 or in battles againstrebels fighting the Sandinistas.
'That was the most moving experience of the trip,' Sheen said. 'They asked us to pray with them and send a message to President Reagan that they forgive him if he would stop the intervention that is taking their sons and daughters.'
Sheen said he wrote a letter to Reagan before he left for Nicaragua asking him to extend Christmas greetings to the Nicaraguan people.
A copy of the letter, which went unanswered, was printed on the front page of the pro-government Managua newspaper Nuevo Diario.
Sheen said he hoped he and Reagan could discuss U.S. policy toward Nicaragua and 'reason together.'
'After all, I have experience that Mr. Reagan lacks in that I have come to the country and talked to the people,' he said.
Sheen said he decided to come after meeting Nicaraguan President-elect Daniel Ortega during his trip to the United States in October.
After the news conference, Sheen and other members of the Witness for Peace delegation gave a pint of blood to the Nicaraguan Red Cross.
He said he had no plans to make a film about Nicaragua or Central America.
'But as an artist, I can't help but have grown in many ways because of this trip,' he said.
