Pubdate: Sat, 04 Aug 2001
Source: International Herald-Tribune (France)
Copyright: International Herald Tribune 2001
Contact:  http://www.iht.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/212
Author: A Washington Post Editorial

A DANGEROUS DELAY

A State Department investigation into a joint U.S.-Peruvian program to 
interdict drug traffickers' airplanes has reached a clear-cut, if 
dismaying, conclusion. According to the report released Thursday, the 
probe, which followed the accidental shooting down in April of a private 
plane carrying American missionaries, found that sloppy discipline and 
procedures explained how CIA-contracted trackers and Peruvian Air Force 
personnel could have combined to target and kill innocent people.

The program dates back to 1994, so the Bush administration can hardly be 
blamed for its failures.

Yet "sloppy" is a word that could also apply to the administration's 
handling of the issue - and its broader start on combating drug trafficking 
in the Andes.

Following the accidental shooting down, which killed a Baptist missionary, 
Veronica Bowers, and her 7-month-old daughter, administration officials 
promised Congress that a thorough investigation would be completed within 
weeks, then used to re- evaluate the air interdiction program, which has 
operated in both Peru and Colombia. In the meantime, tracking operations in 
both countries were suspended.

But as The Washington Post's Karen DeYoung reported this week, once a 
report came back pointing to systematic breakdowns of training, 
communications and safeguards in Peru, officials sat on the results - 
delaying both the promised accountability to Congress and necessary 
decisions about corrective action.

The delay prompted a House vote last month to hold up $65 million in 
military and development aid for Peru until the investigation report is 
delivered and action taken - a potentially serious blow to the 
administration's counternarcotics program in the region as well as to 
Peru's new democratic government.

The slow action on the investigation reflects a general lack of energy and 
impetus in the administration's approach to the troubled countries of the 
Andes. Apart from repackaging the Clinton administration's Plan Colombia as 
an "Andean initiative" spreading counternarcotics aid to neighboring 
countries such as Peru and Ecuador, the administration has given little 
attention to the region's serious problems.

U.S.-$ backed spraying of coca fields under Plan Colombia was recently 
halted by a Colombian judge; in Washington, legislation to renew Andean 
trade privileges is languishing in Congress. Meanwhile, without the U.S.- 
directed airborne tracking, interceptions of narcotics-bearing aircraft 
have all but ceased in Peru and fallen off by 80 percent in Colombia. Such 
backsliding is dangerous.

The Bush administration must act to energize its engagement with the Andean 
countries.

In doing so, it should work with Peru's new government to clean up the 
joint air program and establish procedures and safeguards that will allow 
tracking and interdiction to begin again.
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager