NEW PRESIDENT PLANS TO PULL MILITARY FORCES OFF DRUG DUTIES

MEXICO CITY, MEXICO 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 Monday.

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 Mexican Constitution, which
bars troops from anything other than national defense, they said.

In many Latin American countries, including Mexico--the transit route for
most of the Colombian cocaine consumed in the United States-- armies are
viewed as more honest and less corruptible than police. But there have been
major corruption scandals in recent years involving high-ranking military
officers.