Can you read Spanish?

Nicaragua President Ortega

The letter, just three para-graphs long, was supposed to be no big deal as, once we got our hands on it, the newsroom was buzzing with claims like "I know someone who can read Spanish".

As it turns out, no-one was certain what the letter was meant to communicate. After several phone calls and e-mail exchanges, we were unable to affirm if the note "confirmed" or "denied" that Thaksin had been given Nicaraguan citizen-ship and a passport.

News reports from Nicaragua yesterday seemed to suggest Thaksin had been granted a diplomatic passport. But what does the embassy's letter really say?

The problem apparently lay with three words in the note. The embassy said reports about the alleged granting of Nicaraguan citizenship and a Nicaraguan passport to Thaksin was "adolece de sus-tentacion".

A Spanish teacher who knows the sister of a Nation reporter insisted the embassy was saying the reports "lack basis". One of our multi-lingual sub-editors was less certain. He first said it was a denial, then called back to say he had got it wrong as it could be a confir-mation, only to call back again saying he had got it right the first time.

The other "someones" retreated to their shells upon hearing that their translation would dictate The Nation main headline for its Friday edition.

This may sound rather lame, but can anyone help? Here's what the troublesome second paragraph reads as a whole (The first paragraph refers to the inquiry, and the third and last paragraph is just a "our best regards" diplomatic rou-tine):

"La Embajada de la Republica de Nicaragua infor-ma a la Honorable Embajada Real de Tailandia en Mexico, gue la noticia referida adolece de sustentacion."

And then there was a govern-ment press statement from Nicaragua as reported by Agence France-Press:

President Daniel Ortega has "asked the foreign ministry to accredit him [Thaksin] as an ambassador of Nicaragua on a special mission, in order to facilitate his efforts to bring investments to our country".

And this is what Rosario Murillo, Nicaragua's first lady and government spokes-woman, allegedly said:

"Thaksin Shinawatra was democratically elected by the majority of Thai people, and was then forced to abandon his duty by a coup in 2006."

Thank you in advance and have fun translating! Here's hoping that Thai-style flip-flop-ping has not infected the Nicaraguan leaders.