CRACKDOWN IN MEXICO POINTS TO NEW POLICY

With anti-drug agents having been raided in 11 states, a stricter tack on
corruption seems underway. Agency is likely to be closed.

MEXICO CITY -- After years of investigations compromised by crooked agents
and bureaucratic inefficiency, raids on anti-drug agents in 11 Mexican
states Thursday suggested that the government may be taking a more
methodical and effective approach to combating drug-related corruption,
experts said Friday.

Atty. Gen. Rafael Macedo de la Concha said that the raids were a watershed
and that the agency targeted Thursday and in other recent raids probably
will be dismantled, with many of its functions reassigned to other
departments. It "is going to disappear," Macedo told a radio interviewer.

Soldiers and police Thursday shut down 11 offices of the Federal Special
Prosecutor's Office for Drug Crimes, or FEADS, which is roughly Mexico's
equivalent of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Though no arrests were made, Mexican Justice Department officials said they
were searching for evidence of corruption among agents, a process they said
would take at least two weeks. The army will assist in securing the sites.

The 11 states where the raids took place were Sonora, Yucatan, Chihuahua,
Tamaulipas, Nayarit, Chiapas, Guerrero, Baja California, Tabasco, Jalisco
and Oaxaca.

The dramatic scope of the raids and the apparent degree of cooperation
between the government and the army were in marked contrast to many
previous anti-drug efforts, observers said.

"It seems much more coordinated and comprehensive than what I've seen in
the past," said Ana Maria Salazar, who was a deputy assistant secretary of
defense involved with drug enforcement in the Clinton administration.

Macedo said that in the months ahead, he will create an office subordinate
to the attorney general's office that will take over many of the functions
of FEADS.

A senior U.S. official who requested anonymity said the most likely
candidate to head the new office is Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos, chief
of the attorney general's office's specialized unit on organized crime.

FEADS lately has come under increasing scrutiny. Thursday's raids followed
last week's arrest of six FEADS agents and an administrative employee in
Tijuana. That raid was carried out after two alleged drug traffickers
claimed that the agents had offered to free them and return nearly 5 tons
of confiscated marijuana in exchange for $2 million.

All six of the Tijuana agents, including the head of the squad, Miguel
Uribe, are in jail awaiting trial. Angel Buendia, a top Justice Department
official, said more than 20 additional FEADS officials were under
investigation nationwide, though none has been detained.

Justice Department officials said Thursday's raids were not a direct
response to the Tijuana case but instead represented the continuation of a
broader federal initiative that began in December 2000 at the direction of
President Vicente Fox.

Facing TV cameras Friday, Fox vowed, "The work is going to continue, and we
are not going to rest until these federal agencies have been totally
cleaned up." He said the raids would "serve as a warning to the rest of
those with dirty hands."

Michael S. Vigil, special agent in charge of the San Diego field office of
the DEA, praised Thursday's action as evidence of improved information
sharing and coordination among various government branches under the Fox
administration.

"We have really seen a lot of advances in terms of the Mexican counter-drug
strategy under Vicente Fox," Vigil said. "He has brought many entities into
the fray in this campaign against drugs, including the Mexican army and
other agencies that in the past did not really work in anti-drug efforts."

Thursday's raids also will probably invigorate calls that more
responsibility for anti-drug efforts be moved from the police to the army.
Like the Tijuana roundup, Thursday's operations were carried out by army
troops in full battle gear as well as police inspectors.

Mexican politicians and the public have flip-flopped over the issue of
whether the police or the army should have primary authority in taking on
the vast network that funnels drugs from Mexico, Central America and South
America. In a poll of nearly 14,000 people taken Thursday night by the
Televisa network, 87% of respondents said they thought the army should
assume control of the struggle.

But the army also has been tainted by drug-related corruption. Two
generals, Mario Arturo Acosta Chaparro and Francisco Quiroz Hermosillo,
have been imprisoned since 2000 on drug-trafficking charges, in addition to
being accused of human rights abuses.

Last fall, an army battalion came under investigation in Sinaloa state
after the National Defense Ministry was tipped off that 48 of its 600
soldiers might be engaged in drug smuggling and possession.

Critics of the army's expanded involvement say troops have committed
numerous human rights abuses in pursuit of drug criminals.

Nonetheless, Salazar said, probably only the army has the resources to
carry out a series of simultaneous actions in separate, far-flung locales.

Macedo, former head of the military prosecutor's office, has maintained
good relations with his former army colleagues, Salazar said.

And while the police are widely distrusted by the public, the army has
enjoyed a much higher reputation, she said.