U.S. ENVOY'S DRUG CANDOR RILES MEXICO

Remarks Fuel Fire On New Certification

MEXICO CITY With the Clinton administration preparing to release on
Wednesday the annual list of countries it considers allies in the war
against drugs, some uncommonly frank comments about the scope of drug
trafficking are fueling the debate on Mexican drug policy.

In an unusual breach of diplomatic delicacy, American ambassador
Jeffrey Davidow last week characterized the United States' southern
neighbor as being the world headquarters of drug traffickers.

Although many U.S. drug enforcement officials agree in private with
his reported remarks about the drug trade, Davidow has insisted the
Mexican media misinterpreted his words. Mexico has responded by filing
a formal protest with the Clinton administration.

The controversy not only underscores the sensitive cultural and
economic relationship between the U.S. and Mexico but it also once
again calls into question the reliability of the annual rite of
certification. Mexico is America's second-largest trading partner, a
relationship worth tens of billions of dollars a year. Because of
that, nobody believes the U.S. would ever decertify Mexico as an ally
in the drug war.

By March 1 of every year, the administration must declare which
countries have "fully cooperated" in the drug war. Congress does not
have to approve the list but it has one month to vote to strike a
country off the certification list.

One effect of decertification is the humiliation of appearing on
Washington's list of pariah narco-states, along with countries like
Afghanistan, Burma, Nigeria and Iran. The more tangible impact of
decertification is that the U.S. may deny requests for international
loans and other financial aid.

In past years, the weeks leading up to certification have become
almost predictable: The Mexican government announces the arrest of a
major drug trafficker, and Clinton administration officials praise the
nation's drug-fighting efforts.

On Monday, the Mexican attorney general's office said it had
dismantled a drug-cartel money laundering operation whose activities
included buying apartments in Miami and placing multimillion-dollar
bets in a Russian lottery.

Authorities said police had arrested the chief financial officer of
the cartel allegedly run by Jose and Luis Amezcua. The Amezcua
brothers are known as the leaders in the smuggling of
methamphetamines, or speed, into the U.S.

Both are in a Mexican jail awaiting extradition.

While engaging in this certification ritual, Mexican officials also
have criticized it as a unilateral process contradictory to the spirit
of international cooperation. They charge that the certification
process is hypocritical because Americans are the biggest consumers of
illegal drugs, spending an estimated $50 billion a year.

Congressional critics have noted a discrepancy between rhetoric and
reality. So last Thursday, during a question-and-answer session with
students in Mexico City, Davidow appeared to commit a major diplomatic
gaffe when he said, "The fact is that the world headquarters of
narco-trafficking is already in Mexico."

"And that is the truth," the ambassador said in Spanish. "Just like
the headquarters, the control center, of the Mafia is in Sicily."

Davidow and the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City insisted that his comments
were taken out of context. On Monday, American officials said people
overreacted. What he meant to say is that drug traffickers have bases
worldwide, officials said.

The Embassy emphasized that Davidow had couched his remarks by adding,
"The headquarters of the drug trade are in many countries, and Mexico
is one of them." He went on to say that the biggest drug traffickers
are "Mexicans, Colombians, Dominicans and Russians."

U.S. efforts at damage control did little to quell Mexican
indignation.

"These statements are totally offensive to the dignity of Mexico,"
said Sen. Jorge Calderon of the center-left Party of the Democratic
Revolution.

A former Mexican government official said that more than anything,
Mexicans were reacting angrily because they do not like to be
criticized by outsiders, especially Americans.

He also pointed out that the government is particularly sensitive
because this is a presidential election year.

"We don't like to be told things that we read in the newspaper," he
said. "We don't like to be told by anybody else what we sometimes talk
about in our families.

"The problem of drugs is real."

Because the administration almost certainly will certify Mexico, some
analysts think Davidow's comments were aimed at appeasing critics of
Mexico's annual certification back home.

The Mexican Foreign Ministry protested his comments.

"These statements," the ministry said, "do not contribute to, nor
reflect, the efforts at cooperation between Mexico and the United
States against drugs."

In a recent visit to Mexico, U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey said
cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico had been improving over the
past few years.

In a telephone interview Monday from Alexandria, Va., Thomas
Constantine, the former chief of the U.S. Drug Enforcement
Administration, said Mexico had not "fully cooperated" with the U.S.
in the drug war in the past year, as is the legal requirement for
certification.

In fact, Constantine said, the drug trade in Mexico over the past five
years--during his tenure as DEA administrator--had "deteriorated." He
said Mexico's track record of fighting drug smugglers was worse than
Colombia's.

"Only in Washington and these types of diplomatic circles are you
sanctioned for telling the truth and rewarded for not telling the
truth," Constantine said, adding that he supports the ambassador's
reported characterization.

"I think the first thing that everybody has to understand is that the
control of distribution of narcotics within the United States is
directed by powerful drug mafias.

"The most powerful of those drug mafias in the world today, that
impact the United States, are in Mexico," said Constantine, who left
the DEA last summer.

Constantine said that in many places in Mexico, the drug traffickers
are more powerful than the government.

"We know the people who run the organizations. We know their names. We
know their crimes. We have gained evidence within the United States of
their crimes within the United States, presented them to courts.

"They have (been) indicted, arrest warrants issued for them, dozens
and dozens of them, and they are never located because we are told
they are too powerful for the police and military to locate and
they're never arrested."

Sunday morning, in a trademark drug hit, the police chief of Tijuana,
home to the powerful Arellano Felix drug cartel, was assassinated on
his way home from church.