DESPITE PROBLEMS, ALBRIGHT LAUDS MEXICO WAR ON DRUGS

OAXACA, Mexico -- U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright on Sunday
praised the Mexican government for recent efforts to fight illegal
drug trafficking -- a strong sign that the Clinton administration
again willpush for certification of Mexico as a good ally in the war
on drugs, American officials said.

Certification would head off potential U.S. economic sanctions against
Mexico but would be sure to anger some U.S. law enforcement officials
and their allies in Congress, who believe that Mexico's anti-drug
agencies are riddled with corruption and largely ineffective.

Calling her meeting with Mexican Foreign Secretary Rosario Green ``a
turning point'' in U.S.-Mexico relations, Albright lauded Mexico's
efforts to strengthen its anti-drug agencies. She and Green said both
governments were cooperating well in the effort to keep drugs from
reaching American cities.

Any criticism Albright had was aimed at unnamed people who she said
``wish to undermine'' the cooperative drug effort led by Clinton and
Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de LeF3n.

Each year, as the president and Congress start grading countries on
their work against illegal drugs, sources within U.S. law enforcement
agencies and Congress tell reporters of spectacular failures -- due to
corruption and ineptness -- within Mexico's anti-drug agencies.

This spring may bring more of the same, said U.S. Ambassador to Mexico
Jeffrey Davidow, but it won't obscure improvement in cooperative drug
police work in the last year between the two countries.

``The fact that there are 20 tons of cocaine not on our streets (in
the past year) is because of that increased cooperation,'' Davidow
said, referring to two big cocaine busts in the Pacific Ocean by the
Mexican navy in 1999 -- operations guided by U.S. intelligence.

The cocaine seizures, of about eight tons each, were among the biggest
in recent Mexican history, touted by officials in both countries as
evidence that new police forces and sophisticated intelligence
equipment put to work in 1999 by Mexico are paying off.

Analysts say Mexico supplies at least 300 tons of cocaine each year to
American users, most of it produced in Colombia. Drugs make their way
through the country, guided by Mexican crime bosses who apparently
spread the wealth via bribes to countless Mexican police, military
officials and high-ranking members of Mexico's government.

Such trafficking and corruption irk some American legislators who want
to block Clinton's drug certification of Mexico.

Despite her positive words about Mexico's anti-drug efforts, Albright
would not predict the country's certification status this year.
Countries ``decertified'' by Congress can lose U.S. aid and face trade
sanctions.

``Mexico sees (drugs) as its principal threat to national security,''
Green said, assuring Albright that Mexicans shared the American goal
of a ``continent free of drugs. We'll do whatever it takes to
eliminate this crime.''

Albright's talks with Green in this colonial city, 280 miles southeast
of Mexico City, wrapped up a three-day swing through Latin America
that started in Colombia and included a daylong meeting with
Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso.

Sunday's talks got off to a good start, American officials said,
perhaps because of a morning tour of Monte Alban, a huge
archaeological site that overlooks picturesque Oaxaca. Scientists and
clear skies that afforded a stunning view of the agricultural valley
that surrounds the old city greeted the two secretaries at the
pre-Columbian center of Mexico's ancient Zapotec Indian tribes.

Albright and Green discussed but did not resolve some knotty issues
between the United States and Mexico. The secretaries said controversy
over reluctance by both countries to allow commercial trucks deep into
each other's territory will be settled by a panel of officials
convened under rules of the North American Free Trade Agreement. And
ranking diplomats of each nation said officials continue to work on
ways to prevent the deaths of undocumented Mexican immigrants who try
to cross into the United States through rugged deserts.