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Despite deeply corrupt drug enforcement, the President has re-certified Mexico as "helpful" in the war on drugs. This means Mexico is eligible for U.S. aid to support its anti-drug efforts unless Congress overrules the President. After a background report, Charles Krause talks to Assistant Secretary of State For International Narcotics And Law Enforcement Affairs Robert Gelbard about the decision, and the controversy brewing in Congress to overrule the President.
CHARLES KRAUSE: After days of discussion at the White House and the State Department Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told reporters this afternoon why President Clinton had decided to re-certify Mexico.
A RealAudio version of this NewsHour segment is available.
February 27, 1997:
Charles Krause interviews Sen. Diane Feinstein about her opposition to re-certifying Mexico.
Oct. 4, 1996:
How much of a threat are the EPR rebels's attacks to the future stability of Mexico? Charles Krause reports.
Sept. 13, 1996:
Learn about a terrorist group's activities in Mexico in this Online Forum with NewsHour foreign correspondent Charles Krause, just back from the region.
March 20, 1996:
An interview with Columbia's President Samper, discussing his country's decertification as an ally with the US in it's war on drugs.
The complete NewsHour coverage of Latin America.
EXTERNAL LINKS
The bio of Robert S. Gelbard, Assistant Secretary Of State For International Narcotics And Law Enforcement Affairs
MADELEINE ALBRIGHT, Secretary of State: Let me explain the basis for this decision. First, as President Zedillo has acknowledged, corruption is deeply rooted in Mexican counter-drug institutions. Six Mexican attorney generals and five drug czars have come and gone in the last five years without making major headway against drug barons and officials who operate above the law.
This is a tremendous problem. We would be naive to assume that any Mexican leader could defeat it quickly and without a massive investment of effort, resources, and will. At the same time, the Mexican government's willingness to acknowledge and address the high level corruption that has undermined its drug control institutions is an act of political courage of the highest order. There has been no attempt at a cover-up.
President Zedillo has responded to this crisis with integrity and candor. He is clearly trying to establish clean government, true democracy, and full respect for the rule of law in his country. His work is the best hope for a better future for Mexico, and he has earned our confidence and support. Our certification process is not meant to measure the depth of Mexico's shortcomings but the extent of its cooperation with us in overcoming them. The point, in other words, is not to keep score but to change the score in our favor.
The arrest of Mexico's drug czar for corruption is shocking confirmation of the problems that exist. But it is also a sign of precisely the kind of progress and cooperation that we're trying to encourage. We must also recognize that Mexico's drug seizures and arrests are up. New laws have been enacted to fight money laundering. Major air shipments of drugs which once used Mexican landing strips with impunity, now appear to have stopped. Mexico has set a precedent by extraditing its own nationals. It expelled Juan Garcia Albrego, one of the world's leading drug traffickers who recently received eleven life sentences.
Let us also remember that our relationship with Mexico is strong and among the most important we have with any country in the world. In the last few years President Clinton has repeatedly stood by Mexico at difficult moments. He won ratification of NAFTA and acted decisively during Mexico's economic crisis. These decisions were not entirely popular, but they were right, and they have paid off for the American people. In the long-term they will pay off even more. This is another difficult but correct decision.
It is designed to improve the climate for future cooperation which is the goal of our policy. I'm confident that it will serve the interest of the American people. And the President and I will look to Mexico in the coming months to help us ensure it does.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Joining us now from the State Department is Robert Gelbard, Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement. Mr. Ambassador, welcome.
ROBERT GELBARD, Assistant Secretary of State: Good evening.
CHARLES KRAUSE: We've just heard Sec. Albright say that President Zedillo has earned our confidence. Given all that's happened in Mexico why is that the case?
ROBERT GELBARD: We have real confident in President Zedillo. He obviously has serious problems to confront. He has very little in the way of institutional capabilities. And since he's taken over his job, he's worked very hard to try to develop them. Over the last couple of years, what we've seen is that he's worked with us in much closer ways than any previous Mexican president. And over the course of 1996, we saw good, solid, concrete results which demonstrate that we do have full cooperation.
CHARLES KRAUSE: What kind of response?
ROBERT GELBARD: Seizures are up of cocaine. Seizures have almost doubled of heroin. Eradication of opium poppies and marijuana continue to be among the very best in the world, not just in the hemisphere.
We've seen arrests on new levels for both Mexicans and foreigners for narcotics charges. And for the first time, as Sec. Albright said, they have begun to extradite Mexican nationals, including expelling very important drug traffickers, like Juan Garcia Abrego, into the United States, a Bolivian drug trafficker named Pereda Salas, who's now awaiting trial in Miami, into the United States. So we feel in these and a lot of other ways the cooperation is the best it's probably ever been, and we fully expect it's going to become even better.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Last night, Sen. Feinstein joined us, and she pointed out that, in fact, seizures of cocaine have actually last year were less than they were three years ago. How is it that the progress--what is this progress? Who's right on the this issue?
ROBERT GELBARD: Well, we saw it bottom out a few years ago and now come back. And we've seen change, positive change, in the meantime over the course of 1996. We have every reason to believe it's going to continue. For example, just about two to three weeks ago there was a joint seizure between the U.S. and Mexican navies, 3.2 tons of cocaine. I just read about another seizure of over a ton yesterday, so we see very, very positive signs.
CHARLES KRAUSE: At the same time, Secretary Albright and you on other occasions have acknowledged that there is deep-rooted corruption within Mexico's law enforcement agencies and apparently within the military as well. How high up and how pervasive is that corruption?
ROBERT GELBARD: There's no question that there's serious corruption. And of course we were all really stunned to see the highest level of manifestation of this in the arrest of Gen. Gutierrez Rebollo the other day. The Mexican government and particularly President Zedillo recognize this and what they want to do in cooperation with us, which is a very dramatic statement, is try to work together to develop strong, clean law enforcement institutions. And they want to take measures that they haven't had before, such as the right kinds of background checks, the right kinds of financial checks, and the right kinds of testing to make sure these people are honest.
What really hasn't been very much publicized is that in addition to the arrest of General Gutierrez, they also arrested 36 other people who worked for him. So we think that while there is very, very strong corruption, we have spoken very clearly about that in the past, and I just did on Wednesday in a congressional hearing; that they are dedicated to find clean people, and we expect--we have told them we expect them to take the right kinds of measures to assure that they will continue to be very strong results.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Listening to the Secretary's remarks this afternoon, it's clear that the administration puts a great deal of faith in President Zedillo, himself, and yet, many Mexican observers think that his government is extremely weak and he politically is extremely weak. Do you think, no matter how well intentioned he may be, he has the kind of control necessary to come to grips with this problem?
ROBERT GELBARD: He's taken some unprecedented steps in trying to assure that there is the right kind of cooperation. He has gotten the military involved in unprecedented ways for counter narcotics, and we've seen very positive results as a result of all that. He has taken the important political decision to extradite Mexican nationals which have never been done before.
We think he is determined. I have heard him say personally that he considers this to be the number one national security concern of Mexico. And we feel he does have both the determination and the seriousness and the ability to take the right steps on this issue.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Does he have the political power to do it?
ROBERT GELBARD: I am sure he does. And we have every reason to believe he does.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Secretary of State Albright said that she and Attorney General Reno and others in the administration will be monitoring Mexico's progress over the next year. What will they be looking for to make--so next year's determination will be less troublesome than this year?
ROBERT GELBARD: What we want to do, the President has asked Sec. Albright, Attorney General Reno, General Barry McCaffrey to report to him periodically on the results of our cooperation with Mexico and to demonstrate to him that we have achieved the kinds of results that the Mexican government has committed to us. These include such measures as continued extradition of important drug traffickers and the killers of law enforcement officers in the United States.
It includes measures that the Mexicans have committed to in terms of developing those kinds of clean law enforcement institutions I referred to earlier. It includes a whole range of other kinds of measures that we've agreed are necessary in order to first establish the right kinds of institutional capabilities and that also to achieve the necessary concrete results that we can demonstrate to our joint publics, show the fruits of our cooperation.
CHARLES KRAUSE: To what extent was the decision today a decision that our overall relationship with Mexico is too important to let this one issue tear it apart?
ROBERT GELBARD: The decision was made purely on the basis of counter-narcotics cooperation and in accordance with the law. The test of the law is whether a government's cooperating with us. And what we see in Mexico is that the President and his top advisers are, indeed, cooperating with us.
In contrast, of course, in Colombia, we see a corrupt president, his right-hand man, the interior minister, is corrupt, and we see them undermining the attempts to achieve positive results by other people in the cabinet, such as the foreign minister and the justice minister.
CHARLES KRAUSE: As you know, Sen. Feinstein and I believe some 40 other Senators sent a letter today suggesting that if President Clinton decided to certify Mexico that they would force a vote on the floor of the Senate to decertify Mexico. What would the consequences be if the Congress were to vote to decertify Mexico?
ROBERT GELBARD: Well, we have a lot of--a lot of respect, of course, for Sen. Feinstein and her colleagues, and we hope to engage in some more discussions with them to try to demonstrate the wisdom of the President's decision. Theoretically, it is possible for both Houses of Congress to try to overturn the President's decision, but we certainly hope that won't be the case. And I think the President has demonstrated some great seriousness, great conviction in making this decision. And I know he'll carry through on it.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Would there be diplomatic consequences, though?
ROBERT GELBARD: Oh, I think there'd be enormous consequences in all kinds of ways. And most importantly, we think that the very important, very serious cooperation that we've been developing with Mexico in the counter-narcotics area would be disrupted. We're at a time when we have achieved dramatic breakthroughs in terms of our cooperation, the precedents on extradition, the willingness of Mexico to develop much more fluid cooperation in terms of investigations, in terms of other kinds of results, and we're afraid those would, indeed, be disruptive.
In addition, of course, as you said, we do have a much broader range of relationships with Mexico, perhaps the most--the richest texture of relationships we have in any country in the world, and we also are afraid those would be disrupted too if the Congress did try, even try to overturn this decision by the President.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Amb. Gelbard, thank you very much for joining us.
ROBERT GELBARD: Thank you.
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