Pubdate: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 Source: Chicago Tribune (IL) Copyright: 2000 Chicago Tribune Company Contact: 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611-4066 Website: http://www.chicagotribune.com/ Forum: http://www.chicagotribune.com/interact/boards/ Author: Paul de la Garza U.S. ENVOY'S DRUG CANDOR RILES MEXICO Remarks Fuel Fire On New Certification MEXICO CITY With the Clinton administration preparing to release on Wednesday the annual list of countries it considers allies in the war against drugs, some uncommonly frank comments about the scope of drug trafficking are fueling the debate on Mexican drug policy. In an unusual breach of diplomatic delicacy, American ambassador Jeffrey Davidow last week characterized the United States' southern neighbor as being the world headquarters of drug traffickers. Although many U.S. drug enforcement officials agree in private with his reported remarks about the drug trade, Davidow has insisted the Mexican media misinterpreted his words. Mexico has responded by filing a formal protest with the Clinton administration. The controversy not only underscores the sensitive cultural and economic relationship between the U.S. and Mexico but it also once again calls into question the reliability of the annual rite of certification. Mexico is America's second-largest trading partner, a relationship worth tens of billions of dollars a year. Because of that, nobody believes the U.S. would ever decertify Mexico as an ally in the drug war. By March 1 of every year, the administration must declare which countries have "fully cooperated" in the drug war. Congress does not have to approve the list but it has one month to vote to strike a country off the certification list. One effect of decertification is the humiliation of appearing on Washington's list of pariah narco-states, along with countries like Afghanistan, Burma, Nigeria and Iran. The more tangible impact of decertification is that the U.S. may deny requests for international loans and other financial aid. In past years, the weeks leading up to certification have become almost predictable: The Mexican government announces the arrest of a major drug trafficker, and Clinton administration officials praise the nation's drug-fighting efforts. On Monday, the Mexican attorney general's office said it had dismantled a drug-cartel money laundering operation whose activities included buying apartments in Miami and placing multimillion-dollar bets in a Russian lottery. Authorities said police had arrested the chief financial officer of the cartel allegedly run by Jose and Luis Amezcua. The Amezcua brothers are known as the leaders in the smuggling of methamphetamines, or speed, into the U.S. Both are in a Mexican jail awaiting extradition. While engaging in this certification ritual, Mexican officials also have criticized it as a unilateral process contradictory to the spirit of international cooperation. They charge that the certification process is hypocritical because Americans are the biggest consumers of illegal drugs, spending an estimated $50 billion a year. Congressional critics have noted a discrepancy between rhetoric and reality. So last Thursday, during a question-and-answer session with students in Mexico City, Davidow appeared to commit a major diplomatic gaffe when he said, "The fact is that the world headquarters of narco-trafficking is already in Mexico." "And that is the truth," the ambassador said in Spanish. "Just like the headquarters, the control center, of the Mafia is in Sicily." Davidow and the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City insisted that his comments were taken out of context. On Monday, American officials said people overreacted. What he meant to say is that drug traffickers have bases worldwide, officials said. The Embassy emphasized that Davidow had couched his remarks by adding, "The headquarters of the drug trade are in many countries, and Mexico is one of them." He went on to say that the biggest drug traffickers are "Mexicans, Colombians, Dominicans and Russians." U.S. efforts at damage control did little to quell Mexican indignation. "These statements are totally offensive to the dignity of Mexico," said Sen. Jorge Calderon of the center-left Party of the Democratic Revolution. A former Mexican government official said that more than anything, Mexicans were reacting angrily because they do not like to be criticized by outsiders, especially Americans. He also pointed out that the government is particularly sensitive because this is a presidential election year. "We don't like to be told things that we read in the newspaper," he said. "We don't like to be told by anybody else what we sometimes talk about in our families. "The problem of drugs is real." Because the administration almost certainly will certify Mexico, some analysts think Davidow's comments were aimed at appeasing critics of Mexico's annual certification back home. The Mexican Foreign Ministry protested his comments. "These statements," the ministry said, "do not contribute to, nor reflect, the efforts at cooperation between Mexico and the United States against drugs." In a recent visit to Mexico, U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey said cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico had been improving over the past few years. In a telephone interview Monday from Alexandria, Va., Thomas Constantine, the former chief of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said Mexico had not "fully cooperated" with the U.S. in the drug war in the past year, as is the legal requirement for certification. In fact, Constantine said, the drug trade in Mexico over the past five years--during his tenure as DEA administrator--had "deteriorated." He said Mexico's track record of fighting drug smugglers was worse than Colombia's. "Only in Washington and these types of diplomatic circles are you sanctioned for telling the truth and rewarded for not telling the truth," Constantine said, adding that he supports the ambassador's reported characterization. "I think the first thing that everybody has to understand is that the control of distribution of narcotics within the United States is directed by powerful drug mafias. "The most powerful of those drug mafias in the world today, that impact the United States, are in Mexico," said Constantine, who left the DEA last summer. Constantine said that in many places in Mexico, the drug traffickers are more powerful than the government. "We know the people who run the organizations. We know their names. We know their crimes. We have gained evidence within the United States of their crimes within the United States, presented them to courts. "They have (been) indicted, arrest warrants issued for them, dozens and dozens of them, and they are never located because we are told they are too powerful for the police and military to locate and they're never arrested." Sunday morning, in a trademark drug hit, the police chief of Tijuana, home to the powerful Arellano Felix drug cartel, was assassinated on his way home from church. - --- MAP posted-by: Greg