FOX TO PULL MILITARY OUT OF WAR ON DRUGS

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -- The incoming administration of President-elect
Vicente Fox will gradually pull the Mexican military out of the fight
against the billion-dollar drug trade, aides to Fox said yesterday.

Fox, who dealt the Institutional Revolutionary Party its first presidential
defeat in 71 years in a July 2 election, wants to turn narcotics-busting
into a police responsibility, in line with the Constitution, which
prohibits troops from anything other than national defense, they said.

"We will develop a strategy of gradually demilitarizing the police forces,"
said lawyer Jose Luis Reyes and Sen. Francisco Molina, coordinators
appointed earlier this month to Fox's transition team to work out legal
reform proposals.