Pubdate: Thu, 21 Aug 2003
Source: Miami Herald (FL)
Copyright: 2003 The Miami Herald
Contact:  http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/262
Author: Frances Robles

U.S. SET TO HELP COLOMBIA INTERCEPT PLANES

BOGOTA - In less than two days, the United States will start helping the 
Colombian Air Force to force down planes suspected of flying drugs and 
weapons, using a new safety checklist designed to prevent deadly mishaps, 
officials from both countries said Wednesday.

The program in which U.S. government contractors assisted the Colombian and 
Peruvian air forces to track and force or shoot down suspect planes was 
suspended April 2001 after the Peruvian jet shot down a missionary flight 
mistaken for a drug smuggling plane. A Michigan woman and her infant 
daughter were killed, revealing a series of sloppy procedures that caused 
the tragedy.

For now, the program remains halted in Peru. After a nearly 2 1/2-year 
study, however, the tracking will resume in Colombia with modifications to 
protect legal civilian aircraft and make lethal force the last resort, U.S. 
officials said Wednesday.

=95 Authorities have written a three-phase safety checklist to ensure all 
warnings have been delivered before a suspect plane is shot down.

=95 A U.S. contractor -- fluent in Spanish -- will be aboard the 
radar-equipped tracking plane to make sure the checklist is followed. 
Another U.S. monitor will be on the ground. The monitors will not have the 
authority to halt the operation, but can object.

=95 The tracking planes, provided by the United States, will be flown by a 
Colombian crew, which would prevent communication problems with central 
command on the ground.

In the Peru case, the American contractors flying the tracking plane didn't 
speak much Spanish -- and the Peruvians piloting the attack aircraft were 
not fluent in English.

''Now everyone on the plane will all speak the same language: Spanish,'' a 
U.S. official said.

The Colombian Air Force maintained the program without U.S. help these past 
two years, but was woefully in need of the more advanced radars carried by 
the U.S. airplanes, Colombian Air Force Commander Hector Velasco said at a 
press conference.

In the last year the U.S. airplanes were used, 25 planes were forced to 
land or shot down. The following year: four. Another four were intercepted 
so far this year, a jump Velasco attributes to drug traffickers' desperate 
rush to get drugs out before interceptions resume.

''The benefits of this program are not just for the air force,'' Velasco 
said. ``They're for the whole country.''

Nobody believes the intercept program -- costing Washington $50 million 
over four years -- will dissuade the pilots who smuggle out drugs and fly 
in weapons for Colombia's guerrilla groups.

''They are going to test it to see how good the interception is,'' the U.S. 
official said.

The official stressed the crews tracking the planes will have to go through 
a three-phase process before shooting a plane out of the sky.

First, they must take all steps to identify the plane through its tail 
numbers, radio calls, or visual signs. Phase two, which requires permission 
from a Colombian air force commander, allows warning shots. The third 
phase, which requires permission again, is to shoot at the plane with the 
aim of forcing it to land safely.

''The objective here is not to shoot down planes,'' Colombian Vice Defense 
Minister Andres Soto told The Herald. ``It's intercepting air corridors 
that are being used for drugs.''

Despite the modifications, the program came under attack from human rights 
groups that accuse Americans of designing a program they could never 
implement at home, where deadly force can only be used in self- defense.

''They are authoring and supporting a policy they wouldn't be able to use 
in the United States, because it is simply illegal,'' said Jose Miguel 
Vivanco, director of Human Rights Watch's Americas division.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Larry Stevens