MEXICAN DRUG-USE BILL TO BE TOUGHENED

MEXICO CITY - Stung by opposition to a bill that would permit the
possession of small quantities of narcotics, a top Mexican senator
said yesterday the legislation will be toughened to reassure critics
that Mexico is not opening its doors to drug users.

President Vicente Fox's government has been bombarded with questions
over the past five days from U.S. and Mexican officials who worry that
Mexico is backing away from drug enforcement.

Fox's spokesman said the president will sign the bill, but there are
signals that Fox may be distancing himself from the legislation, which
his office said differs from the proposal he sent to Congress in
January 2004.

When San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders met yesterday with Luis Cabrera,
the Mexican consul general in San Diego, Cabrera "started by saying:
'First, you need to know the president hasn't signed the bill. It's
just a bill,' " said mayoral spokesman Fred Sainz.

"When you lead with that, you know your argument has problems," Sainz
said.

As that meeting was taking place in San Diego, Karen Tandy, the head
of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, was expressing her
concerns during a meeting in Mexico City with Public Security Minister
Eduardo Medina-Mora.

Baja California Gov. Eugenio Elorduy called Medina-Mora to discuss the
impact the law would have on border cities such as Tijuana.

Meanwhile, U.S. officials met with representatives of the Fox
government in Washington, D.C., on Monday and "urged them to clarify
the law so it would not make it attractive to those who would go to
Mexico to use drugs," said Judith Bryan, press attache for the U.S.
Embassy in Mexico City.

Sanders, who has called Friday's 53-26 Senate vote "appallingly
stupid," was not swayed by Cabrera's assurances.

"Let's be truthful. 'Small quantities' is a diplomatic nicety that is
fairly transparent," Sainz said. "We remain incredibly concerned. If
passed, this would be a law enforcement problem for our county, a
judicial problem for our county and a public health emergency for our
county."

Sen. Jorge Zermeno, a member of Fox's National Action Party who heads
the Senate's justice committee, said the controversy boils down to one
word - "user."

"What generated all this confusion and what distorted the fundamental
objective of the law was that the legislators added the word 'user,' "
Zermeno said. "We are going to present a modification to this reform
to eliminate the confusion."

The current criminal code allows judges to waive jail time for people
who can prove they are addicts and possess drugs "for personal use."

Mexican officials said they were changing the law because current laws
do not define the amount of drugs one can possess without being
subject to criminal prosecution. Officials said dealers caught with
drugs would say they were addicts and that the drugs they possessed
were for personal use to avoid jail, even when they might be carrying
dozens of doses.

The new bill is aimed at clarifying possession for personal use while
cracking down on small-time dealers, Zermeno said.

"The objective is not to send drug users to jail," Zermeno said. "The
objective is to jail those who sell, those who traffic, those who
enrich themselves, those who poison others.

"Now, it looks to everyone like we are legalizing, that we are
authorizing people to carry these quantities of drugs because they are
users. We have to eliminate the word 'user' so that only those people
who can show that they have an addiction, who have a medical
prescription, can possess these quantities."

The bill also gives new authority to local and state law enforcement
to arrest drug dealers. Now, only federal law enforcement can arrest
people on drug charges.

"With this reform, more people go to jail," said Luis Javier Algorri
Franco, Tijuana's minister of security.

Medina-Mora said the law "constitutes an indisputable advance in the
efforts of the Mexican government to fight small-scale trafficking and
drug addiction."

Small-scale trafficking is now one of the biggest threats to public
security, he said. Mexico's youths and children are consuming drugs at
an alarming pace, with per-capita use growing at an annual rate of 20
percent over the past 10 years.

As the demand for cocaine has declined in the United States, more of
the drug is being sold by cartels in Mexico, Medina-Mora said. Sales
of hard drugs have fallen so dramatically that the cartels earned more
money last year from marijuana than from cocaine, he added.

But he insisted that Mexico will not become a playground for
international drug users.

"They will not find in our country a paradise for illegal activities,"
he said. "Mexico is not, has not been, and will not be a refuge for
anybody who wants to come to our country to consume drugs.

But Sainz said yesterday, "We believe that the fact that it remains
illegal to sell drugs, but it would be legal to possess them, is a
distinction without difference."

Sainz and San Diego's director of binational affairs, Alejandra
Gavaldon, who both speak Spanish, read the Mexican legislation Monday.
They were disturbed that the bill would allow some users to possess
small quantities of marijuana, Ecstasy, cocaine and even heroin.

But Cabrera said the law does not mean that someone found with a small
quantity of drugs will not go through the legal system.

"This doesn't mean that a person won't be brought to a prosecutor or
judge," he said. "A person found with a certain amount below (the
threshold) will be sent to a prosecuting agent."

Cabrera said prosecutors will make individual decisions in these minor
drug cases as to what is the appropriate punishment. A fine could be
levied, or the person could be sent to jail for a few days. If the
person is an addict, he or she could be required to go to a drug
rehabilitation program, Cabrera said.

Medina-Mora said, "With all due respect to the mayor of San Diego, our
youths, our children are just as much of a concern for us as the young
people who visit our country."