AIRCRAFT TRAGEDY LEADS TO DOUBTS OVER DRUG PATROLS

The Senate Intelligence Committee chairman cast doubt on the future of what
he called a "very valuable" anti-drug-trafficking programme in Peru that led
to the downing of a plane carrying American missionaries in which a woman
and her daughter were killed.

"When you lose a young woman and her child because of a lack of
communication, I believe, among other things, it's just too much," Sen
Richard Shelby, an Alabama Republican, said after a secret briefing by CIA
Director George Tenet.

He praised President George W Bush for suspending the programme, in which
CIA workers conduct surveillance over drug-growing areas of Peru and point
out potential drug-trafficking planes to Peruvian air force authorities, who
then decide what to do about it.

Shelby, like Bush administration officials before him, indicated the problem
stemmed from the Peruvians improperly "accelerating" procedures, not taking
all the steps needed to determine whether the pontoon plane carrying the
family of four and a pilot was involved in drug trafficking.

He indicated that Americans didn't skip any steps.

"I don't believe that the Americans accelerated the shoot-down of anything,"
Shelby said. "The American role ... was to provide information and they have
not had a role in whether or not an interception takes place. That is up to
Peru."

The CIA crew contacted its base in Peru when it became clear the Peruvians
were set to shoot down the plane, a US intelligence official said, speaking
on condition of anonymity. The crew described what was going on and related
their uneasiness with what was happening, he said.

The downing occurred at most two minutes later, the official said, adding
that the crew could do little since it was not in a position to tell the
Peruvians what to do.

An audiotape abroad the US surveillance plane shows CIA officers expressing
doubts that the civilian aircraft it had been tracking was smuggling drugs,
20 minutes before it was shot down, The Washington Post reported.

But the CIA crew didn't vigorously protest until the Peruvian jet began
firing on the plane. The crew was under the impression that the Peruvian jet
would simply approach the plane and read its serial numbers, the Post quoted
an unidentified US official as saying. The tape also makes clear that the
CIA crew members had difficulty communicating with the Peruvian liaison on
the plane because they didn't speak Spanish well enough.

Peru's prime minister, meanwhile, said it was too early to lay blame for the
downing.

"I think that for the moment it would be premature to say that Peru's air
force was responsible or that the pilot of the plane was responsible," said
Javier Perez de Cuellar, who was in New York.

Tenet said his investigation should be done within 48 hours, Shelby said,
adding that the pilots have not yet been debriefed and he wants to hear the
Peruvians' side.

Despite Shelby's misgivings, the US surveillance flights could resume in a
few weeks as the United States tries to prevent drug traffickers from taking
advantage of a lull in enforcement, said a State Department official, who
spoke on condition of anonymity.

Within the next few days, US officials are expected to leave for Lima to
talk with Peruvians about Friday's downing.

A surveillance plane owned by the US Air Force and operated by three CIA
contract employees accompanied by a Peruvian technician, spotted the
missionaries' plane and called it to the attention of the Peruvian military.

US officials have said the Peruvians failed to take all the required steps -
such as checking out the plane's identification number and signaling it to
land - before ordering the plane shot down. Killed was missionary Veronica
"Roni" Bowers, 35, and her adopted 7-month-old daughter, Charity. Her
husband Jim and their 6-year-old son, Cory, survived, as did pilot Kevin
Donaldson, who was wounded and in fair condition after undergoing surgery on
both legs.

The Peruvians have said they took all necessary steps, but the plane's
occupants failed to respond to radio messages.

Republican Sen Lincoln Chafee praised the US-Peruvian efforts since the
mid-1990s to reduce cocaine production by virtually closing the so-called
"air bridge" between Peruvian coca growing areas and Colombian cocaine
production sites. Peru's coca cultivation has dropped dramatically.

"It's a very strict policy, and, to be frank, a very successful policy of
restrictin drug trafficking - a shoot-first, ask-questions-later policy,"
said Chafee, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on the
Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps, narcotics and terrorism. "One ingredient of
its success was its severity. It drove the trafficking out of Peru."