Mr. Edén Pastora, former leader of the Sandino guerrillas, in a campaign (Source: Getty Images)

During the daring raid on the national palace of Nicaragua on August 22, 1978, 25 Sandino National Liberation Front (FSLN) guerrillas captured about 1,000 parliamentarians and leaders of the dictatorial government of Anastasio Somoza to ask to release 50 imprisoned Sandino soldiers.

The commander of this raid was Edén Pastora, who always carried a portrait of President Ho Chi Minh in his breast pocket in life-and-death moments.

Recalling his memories, veteran diplomat Nguyen Huu Dong - a UN election advisor in Nicaragua - recalled the meeting with Mr. Edén Pastora at his home in the capital Managua in 1996.

In the friendly atmosphere of the meeting, the former Sandino guerrilla leader shared about his path to revolution, as well as his personal feelings for President Ho Chi Minh and the Communist Party of Vietnam.

Born in 1937 into a middle-class family in northern Nicaragua, Edén Pastora witnessed his father being murdered by the Somoza regime at the age of 8. Since then, the boy has nurtured hatred for the dictatorial government and this was the motivation for Edén Pastora to follow the revolutionary path to overthrow the Somoza regime.

Edén Pastora carried the burning ambition with him during his years studying medicine in Mexico, where he had the opportunity to access more information about national liberation movements around the world, about Marx-Leninism, Cuban revolution, Fidel Castro, the heroic national defense struggle of the Vietnamese people as well as President Ho Chi Minh - who he admired most in his revolutionary life.

Putting aside his unfinished studies, in the late 1960s of the last century, Edén Pastora returned to his homeland to join the revolutionary movement, holding the position of commander of the guerrilla force operating in the southern region of Nicaragua, together with the Sandino National Liberation Front to create a pincer against the Somoza government in the capital Managua.

Recounting the story of Edén Pastora, Mr. Nguyen Huu Dong said that throughout the fighting journey from the beginning of his participation in the revolution until the revolution's success in 1979, the legendary guerrilla commander always carried with him a portrait of Ho Chi Minh, who he always admired, considered the source of inspiration for all victories of the revolution, especially Ho Chi Minh’s ideology of long-term resistance was a great source of spiritual encouragement for Sandino during the difficult periods of the revolution.

Mr. Nguyen Huu Dong, who worked in information work at the Paris Conference on Vietnam, said that at the meeting, Edén Pastora showed him the portrait of Ho Chi Minh that had followed the guerrilla leader for decades of fighting. It was a photo of Uncle Ho cut from the cover of a foreign magazine and was wrapped very carefully.

Mr. Dong - the first Vietnamese person introduced by the Vietnamese Government to work for the United Nations in the early 1980s of the last century with decades of working as an international election monitoring expert in more than 40 countries until his retirement in Mexico - said that those were memorable, proud and emotional moments when he felt the special affection of international friends for President Ho Chi Minh.

Before he died in June 2020, “Comandante Cero” and his wife were still living in a small wooden house on the edge of the forest near the Costa Rican border, where nearly half a century ago he and his comrades had taken up arms to liberate the country./.

BTA