Interviews and bios of the key players:
Montesinos Kurlander Blanca Romero Benavides Crespigny Maugein Gamarra
This interview between Peter Romero and correspondent Lowell Bergman took place on August 12, 2005, in Washington, D.C. It is edited for clarity.
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Peter Romero |
Maybe you can help explain what the nature of the government in Peru was during the 1990s.
Well, it was probably best characterized as an elected dictatorship -- largely driven by the force of President Alberto Fujimori's personality. He was a very closed person, confided in very few people…Nobody, very few people, knew what he was thinking -- his brother Santiago, his daughter at the end and this guy Vladimiro Montesinos, who he confided in, and that was it. Everything was very centrally controlled, and while there were some good things done for the country -- and you can't dispute the fact that law and order was restored to the country -- it was very, very bad for a while. And although foreign investment started flying in, it came at a severe cost. The cost was the civil liberties and individual freedoms of citizens and the institutionalization of democracy, and that really was the victim in all of this.
Democracy was the victim and corruption increased?
I don't think that we, the United States, knew the extent of the corruption. I think that during that time, particularly as it related to the courts, there was a lot of corruption in the existing court system. Fujimori created a kind of parallel court system in an effort, as he explained it, to provide time to reform the real courts of the country, and to have a system that would be a little less subject to bribery and intimidation and corruption and that sort of thing. In retrospect, it was bad if not worse than the regular court system.
Who was Montesinos?
It's interesting. Montesinos was probably the only person in the Fujimori government Alberto Fujimori really relied on and confided in. During that time, there was the takeover of the residence of the Japanese ambassador. Hundreds of diplomats and their spouses were taken. He became a key player in getting those people released subsequently by taking out the terrorists. He was relied upon heavily by Fujimori because [Fujimori] trusted him and thought he was tough. … And that was his undoing.
Montesinos was Fujimori's undoing because he trusted him?
Well, because it was obvious that he was corrupt, that he was in it for his own self-aggrandizement -- that he wasn't as loyal to the president as the president thought he was. And, in retrospect, he had his own parallel apparatus going with respect to security and with respect to the judiciary and that sort of thing. In other words, there was a lot that was going on behind the scenes that people, average Peruvian people and opinion makers, were afraid to talk about for fear of retribution. But there was essentially a parallel government being run out of the intelligence organizations and military and judiciary.
Well, I'm trying to get a sense of what this means because as I understand it, Montesinos had a very close relationship, or at least a paid relationship, with the Central Intelligence Agency. So we had a relationship with him.
I think there was some kind of paid relationship early on, not when he was the defacto head of the intelligence apparatus. I don't think there was a paid relationship, at least no one I knew at the State Department or the ambassador knew anything about a paid relationship during that time.
But he met really regularly with the CIA station chief?
He did, and the rule was -- because we knew that he was a shadowy guy, though not obviously the extent of what he did in the shadows, even at that time -- any time that the station chief in the embassy wanted to meet with Montesinos, they could meet with his underlings. But any time they wanted to meet with him personally, they had to notify the ambassador and the ambassador had to OK it and know what they were going to talk about.
So there was a controversy about that relationship in the U.S. government?
There was a controversy about it, and I'm not going to name agencies, but I will say that the State Department, which over a two-year period in interagency meetings, many of which I attended, strenuously tried to distance ourselves from Montesinos… In August of 2000, I was able to get interagency consent to basically have the Secretary of State, then Madeleine Albright, tell Alberto Fujimori…that we would no longer be dealing with Montesinos and that we recommended he be replaced. Ironically, that came not more than a week or two before all of these tapes exposed Montesinos, exposing him with bribery, extortion, intimidation and all the other things which began to unravel his relationship and his position in government. … Alberto Fujimori was shocked, was absolutely dumbfounded that we would make that decision. But it was worth the fight.
Well, let me take you back now into the gold mine situation. At some point when you were the Acting Assistant Secretary, you became aware that there was a problem in Peru related to Newmont Mining in a case that had reached the Peruvian Supreme Court. Do you remember what you were told, what you were shown or what the problem was?
There was a retired Foreign Service officer, who I trusted, who had brought to my attention that there was a company called Newmont Mining out of Denver and that they had an issue in Peru. They asked me to meet with some of their representatives when they were coming in to Washington from Denver, which I agreed to do.
Do you remember who the representatives of Newmont were who came to see you in Washington?
I remember their legal counsel came. There might have been one other person and Mr. Larry Kurlander, who was the head of their government external affairs at the time, a vice president.
And did they show you evidence of interference by the French? What did they show you that convinced you that they had a problem?
I guess they told me that there was possible intimidation…The case went to the Supreme Court in Peru, and there seemed to be growing indications that the French government was involved in trying to get a favorable decision for the French company. That's not bad in itself. If we do our jobs as diplomats, we represent our companies overseas to make sure that the playing field is level and that they get a fair shot at what it is they want out of the courts in terms of the decision.
Normally there's an office that takes care of these reports or concerns?
Well, normally, there's an office in the State Department that does advocacy for U.S. business… Keep in mind that one of the most important things about all of this is that U.S. business has been disadvantaged for decades ... because we have something called the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act … if you try to bribe a foreign official, you can go to jail in the United States. … While foreign businessmen, Europeans and others, have laws on their books, it's generally ignored when they offer bribes or intimidation or that sort of thing to public officials. … It's standard operating procedure for companies from certain countries. We know that. We've seen decades of that. …That's what the competition is doing.
Was there any evidence that the French were doing this?
While there was evidence, so-called evidence, that was brought to me about wrongdoing on the part of representatives hired by the French company…what I saw and the decision that we made at the State Department to support Newmont was predicated on what we saw in terms of French government or French embassy involvement in pursuing this case with ministers, with Fujimori and with judges.
You believe that there was contact from the French government or a French company with the president of Peru and with judges on the Supreme Court?
With ministers and the president, and likely judges, although I had no proof of the judges. Our role was to basically be in a mode of being able to tell the French, or pardon me, the Peruvian government that we want the playing field leveled. We want to make sure that judges are able to make a decision free of intimidation or inducements or enticements or anything else … that they make decisions or decide on the merits of the case and not all of these other external factors … and that the Peruvian government knows that the U.S. government will be watching.
You hand-delivered a letter from the Undersecretary as the acting secretary to, I believe, the prime minister of Peru in 1997...
Right. There was no hidden agenda on the part of the U.S. government in terms of what we wanted to do. We want honest decisions based on the merits of the case. We're not telling them to decide in favor of the U.S. company. What we're saying is make sure that this process is free of enticements to and intimidations of your Supreme Court justices....
Did you do anything like that similarly in other countries in Latin America?
At that level? I can't recall anything involving the Supreme Court, but certainly throughout all of Latin American and the Caribbean this is an issue. And that is, I can't tell you how many cases I saw as an ambassador … I can give you lots of examples, but there were times when U.S. business would hire, would form a merger or some kind of business relationship with a local businessman, that business would go sour, or the local businessman would allege that he was owed money, or to ensure that he was paid, he would go and pay off the judge and the judge would issue an arrest order for his ex-partner, all of a sudden the police would come knocking on his door, take him away to a jail or take him away to a hospital and … basically keep him there until the judge got the signal from the local partner that he was satisfied. I saw this all the time.
But this was higher stakes … a multibillion-dollar mine.
This was higher stakes. It was a multibillion-dollar mine, that's right. Exactly, exactly.
And it became the most profitable gold mine in the world.
Indeed it did. But…at the time I didn't know that this would become the most profitable gold mine in the world, nor did Newmont or anybody else. We did it based on the fact that anybody who had a problem that was in the judiciary or in the executive branch … where there was reason to believe that there might be attempts at influencing decisions by a foreign government on behalf of a foreign company in their country, we wanted to make sure that the playing field was leveled and that we were doing our part.
And as I understand it, at that time in France, bribes were tax deductible for companies.
They say that. They say that. [laughs] I've heard that a lot. I haven't read their tax code, but yes, I've heard that a lot, and French companies were operating on that basis. And the only thing that our government, that our companies can do is to energize the embassies and consulates and the State Department to act on their behalf to insure that people who would accept these bribes are put on notice. That we're watching.
Why did you call Montesinos? I mean, he's not in a foreign affairs department, he's not in the office of the presidency, he's essentially the head of the CIA, if you will, and the FBI in Peru?
Largely because the Peruvian government was dysfunctional. The only people that really knew what was going on were the president, sometimes his immediate family and Vladimiro Montesinos. And, if you wanted to ensure that a message that was delivered at the ministerial level would get back to the president, you went to Montesinos…Fujimori ran that government out of his own pocket. Out of his own back pocket, and I, we wanted to make sure that the president got the message.
You discussed this with your superiors at the State Department before you made the call?
I did. And at the time, we were having a difficult relationship with him over the issue of human rights and civil liberties and individual rights and that sort of thing.
With Fujimori?
With Fujimori, right. And our ambassador at the time, under guidance from the State Department, was taking a much harder line on evidence, which began to come out that there was much more behind the curtailing of civil liberties and the lack of institutionalization of democracy and that sort of thing by Fujimori himself.
So you decided to go to Montesinos.
Well, I think it was a State Department decision to basically transmit a message through him to Alberto Fujimori.
On the phone, what kind of guy is Montesinos? We've seen him on videotape; so on the phone, what is he like?
He seemed to be a nice enough fellow, seemed to take what I was saying as important. Told me that he would transmit the message to the president. We didn't have a lot of chitchat or anything like that. It was basically centered on the letter that we delivered, and he basically said, "I will pass on that information." I mean, it was not much more than that.
Do you remember a second conversation?
I remember two conversations. But I don't remember a conversation after that decision was made.
What was the second conversation about?
About the same thing. It was pretty much about the same thing, because we had gotten increasing indications that the French government was really becoming active in this…We had instructed our embassy in Paris to go into the French foreign ministry and to put the French foreign ministry on notice because we were concerned about judges being able to make a decision free of pressure by the French government. …They subsequently came back to us and said there is no pressure, etc., etc., which is what we expected anyway, but we wanted to make sure that they knew that we were watching.
Now you know, after Montesinos and Fujimori fled the country, the videotapes came out, the so-called Vladivideos, at least some of them. Some people say that this is only the first stage.
Right.
And there's a Vladivideo, a recording in April 1988, and in that video, Montesinos is meeting with the then station chief in Lima for the CIA, Don Arabian. And he … starts talking to him about the Newmont case … which is still before the Peruvian Supreme Court. And he says in that videotape, "I've gathered documents; I've gathered e-mails and other materials."
Who says that?
Montesinos to Arabian. He says, "Peter Romero will know what to do with them. I'm going to have them sent to you."
What kind of materials?
It sounds like he had intercepted wire taps and intercepted emails and other documents involving the French and their role and that he was offering these to Don Arabian. And he says, "I will forward them to you tomorrow." And he mentions your name. He says that Peter Romero will know what to do with this.
I don't know. I've never … I don't recall ever getting a package like that.
You haven't heard this before?
No.
You never got any documents or any communication that you recall?
I never knew that there was anything that he was collecting.
Why was he referring to Rio Accords and the national security side of this?
Because at the time, the United States was one of the guarantors of the territorial dispute between Peru and Ecuador. And I think he thought that we would be watching this decision and somehow this would affect our position, if you will, in terms of their claim toward Ecuador in this land dispute.
And then subsequently on videotape, a seventh judge was appointed in the Peruvian case, the deciding judge. The day after he's appointed, he meets with Montesinos. And Montesinos explains to him on videotape, "This is very important. You have to vote for the American company because it's a matter of national interest." You're not aware that that happened?
No.
Even after, when years later, all these videotapes came out, it became public, no one in the State Department informed you from Peru …
No, I read that he had a meeting with Beltrán afterward when the videotapes came out. It's unfortunate that this happened the way it did. We're clearly on record in written and oral conversations to insure that the playing field is level -- that judges make their decisions on merits and that's really what the State Department, and our embassy and our ambassador, was pushing for. Now, if he took it a step further and decided to manipulate things behind the scene, it's regrettable, but that's not what we wanted.
Mr. Kurlander came to see you in 1997, and I guess met with you several times after that. He presented you with evidence, as I understand it, that the French were doing what you call extracurricular activities. Did you know that he then went to see Montesinos?
No.
He never told you that he was going to see Montesinos.
Not that I recall.
There's a memo here from the State Department that we obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, and it looks like it was authored by you. Of course, it's mostly blacked out.... [reading the memo] It says "talking points, Montesinos's call." Could there have been another call to Montesinos?
Another call? I said that there were two, and I don't recall, I mean we're talking now … six or seven years ago. I don't remember the exact juxtaposition of when those two calls occurred.
This would be after the Peruvian Supreme Court decision comes on June 3. This one's on August 20, so it's not clear to me why you would be calling him after the Supreme Court decision.
I don't know.
And there's also a bunch of memos, I can give you the copies of all of them. There is this memo, which appears to be authored or coming from your office. It appears to be a summary, then it's blacked out.
There was some concern that the French were then appealing to various international courts of arbitration. You know, they were unhappy with the Peruvian decision. So maybe it has to do with that, I don't know. This is just basically a closing of the loop with Eizenstat and Undersecretary Pickering in terms of what the status of the case was and that sort of thing.
So this was being monitored high up in the State Department.
Monitored … you know, I think that's a stronger word [than I would use]. I think basically any kind of advocacy that we do at a high level needs to be reported. And folks who were responsible for this sort of thing at the highest levels of the State Department need to be informed. And that's what this is.
Well, we beat the French.
That's always good, too, although it would have been better if we would have beat them clearly with judges that were making their own decisions.
I mean, the obvious question is that Newmont Mining goes to see Montesinos -- Mr. Kurlander, that is. You talk to him on the phone. The ambassador apparently tried to communicate with him. There's videotape of the head of the CIA in Lima meeting with him. And Montesinos meets with the judge who makes a deciding vote in the case and comes out in favor of the U.S. company. Looks like the U.S. government went to the secret police chief of a country, and asked him to go talk to the judge, maybe didn't ask him directly but that's how he interpreted it.
It's regrettable that that's how he interpreted it because every single message that we conveyed was "make sure that the judges are able to decide on the merits of the case." Now if he interpreted that as "we want a favorable decision for Newmont, a U.S. company," that's regrettable.
Not for Newmont.
Not for Newmont, but for the purposes of the rule of law it's regrettable, OK. But we did our jobs in terms of making sure that people knew that we would be watching to insure that Newmont would get a fair shake with the judges.
I'm sitting out there, and I'm trying to understand this. And, I know that Montesinos is concerned about the peace treaty with Ecuador. That we're a guarantor, as you said.
Right.
How do you separate the two out? That he's not going to say to himself, "This is very important to the national security of our country. Make sure this comes out the way the Americans want it to come out." Are you just talking cryptically when you tell Montesinos we want a level playing field? Or do you know he's going to understand we've got a lot of clout in other places?
Lowell, we represent to the best extent that we can U.S. individuals and business interests overseas. That's what we do. Apart from all of the foreign policy things that our embassies and consulates do overseas, our main job is to represent U.S. individuals and U.S. companies overseas. In this case, what we said, clearly on the record, is we wanted a level playing field. Now if they took that message of a level playing field and interpreted it differently? OK. Good for Newmont, regrettable for the rule of law in Peru, OK? But as a State Department, we did our jobs in terms of advocacy for a U.S. company at a time when it didn't look like they were going to get a fair shake.
Did you have any evidence that the judges weren't deciding the case based on the merits?
There was a body of information that was given to me by representatives of Newmont that indicated -- and this was from private investigators that they had hired -- that indicated there might be inducement and offers and that sort of thing, and threats made toward Peruvian Supreme Court justices. That was not the compelling reason why the United States got involved. The compelling reason why the United States got involved was because through other channels and through other sources, it became apparent that the French government was involved. And, in order for us to deflect whatever pressure the French government would have on the Peruvian justice system, we wanted to ensure that was neutralized.
And the French say, "All we did was have our ambassador talk to various Peruvian officials, and in this case President Chirac sent a letter asking for exactly the same thing from President Fujimori. We're watching. And we have reason to believe that the Americans are interfering in the Peruvian Supreme Court."
We didn't have copies of that letter. We didn't know what was said. We did know that there were letters and there were several meetings between French official representatives, including their ambassador. And why wouldn't the U.S. government get involved if it looked like the government where the foreign company is housed is being activist on the subject? I don't understand why there's something wrong with … the State Department basically coming in and matching what it is the French government is doing.
You went to work for Newmont Mining after you left the State Department.
It was a couple years after the Supreme Court decision…It would have been maybe March of 2001 when I announced my retirement, and I guess maybe Larry [Kurlander] had heard about it, and he called me up and was in town, and we had lunch. And he basically started talking to me about the possibility of maybe working for Newmont, or within Newmont, or becoming a consultant. And at that moment, I wrote a letter that recused myself from all of Newmont's issues, which is what we do. And I passed those issues on to my deputy to take care of.
Isn't there the appearance of conflict? That here's this very, very valuable decision in the Peruvian Supreme Court, that you wind up talking to Montesinos, that he then testifies, that it's in part because of his conversations with you that he intervenes with at least one of the judges in the case -- the deciding vote. And then later you go to work for Newmont.
We wanted a straight up and down decision based on the merits. The records show it. Everybody that was involved with this says the same thing. If the Peruvians decided otherwise it was regrettable, but we, our primary purpose overseas beyond advocacy was to seek the rule of law. Very important to us, very important to me personally. I spent 25 years in government, and that was one of the things, if not the major thing, I tried to advance during my time in government. Several years went by before I announced my retirement. Newmont had heard about it; they thought that I was an activist individual that could help them, particularly as it relates to community-based programs and that sort of thing. At that point in time they had problems with the local community, so they hired me to put together kind of a local program for them in terms of job generation and that sort of thing. And that's what I did. And I worked for them as a consultant for about 18 months.
This is my last question but it goes to what you were doing in and around the mine after you left. Today, Newmont talks about how, yes, they had a government license and government approvals to operate the mine and the decision of the Supreme Court to have dominant control of the mine. But because of subsequent events, environmental problems and other problems, they say they've learned a lesson. They now need to have a social license to operate, expand and be profitable. I wonder if you could comment on that?
We could spend weeks on this subject. But essentially in most developing parts of the world, more is expected when a U.S. company is involved than if a European or Asian company is involved. And quite frankly, I do believe that we should be leading by example around the world, whether it be in the public sector, state department, other agencies of the U.S. government and our embassies overseas, but also the private sector. We hold ourselves to a higher standard with respect to adherence to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, where we don't pay bribes and intimidate and things like that. But also, I think we have a responsibility on the social side, and if you spend as much time overseas as I have, in both the public and the private sectors, you find that by and large U.S. companies are much more engaged in philanthropy and doing good work at the local level than most national and local companies are, largely because I think our people are more sensitized to it, and it becomes good business. Now does that mean there aren't sweatshops around the world and that there aren't abuses? No. But by and large, U.S. companies do, I think, lead by example when they go overseas, and part of it is this social contract.