News (Media Awareness Project) - US: Wire: US Says Losing Panama Base Hurt Its Anti-Drug Efforts |
| Title: | US: Wire: US Says Losing Panama Base Hurt Its Anti-Drug Efforts |
| Published On: | 1999-05-05 |
| Source: | Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (NY) |
| Fetched On: | 2008-09-06 07:04:16 |
U.S. SAYS LOSING PANAMA BASE HURT ITS ANTI-DRUG EFFORTS
WASHINGTON - Anti-drug efforts in Latin America have been weakened by the
ending of surveillance flights from a U.S. base in the Canal Zone, the
administration said yesterday. The zone is being transferred to Panama.
State and Defense Department officials said they planned to restore full
operations within two years by building up three smaller staging centers in
the region. However, lawmakers at a House hearing charged the
administration with handling the changeover badly.
"I am deeply alarmed by the administration's disjointed and half-hearted
response to the impending withdrawal of U.S. forces from Panama," said Rep.
Benjamin Gilman, R-Middletown, Orange County, chairman of the House
International Relations Committee.
Howard Air Force Base in the Canal Zone, which ended flights on May 1, was
"the crown jewel in our fight against drugs," Gilman said at a hearing of a
Government Reform subcommittee overseeing drug policy.
Ana Maria Salazar, the Pentagon's deputy assistant secretary for drug
enforcement policy, acknowledged that there would be "a degradation." She
estimated that surveillance coverage of the Caribbean region at the moment
was only half what it was two years ago.
Salazar said the United States had been flying 2,000 counter-drug missions a
year out of Howard, and operations should be up to 85 percent next year as a
result of new interim agreements for use of airfields in Ecuador and the
Dutch islands of Aruba and Curacao. And the government was looking for a
third location that would boost surveillance to 110 percent of the 1997
level by 2001.
The United States turns the canal over to the Panamanian government on Dec.
31, 1999, under the terms of the treaty negotiated by the Carter
administration in 1977. Panama will take over five U.S. military bases,
70,000 acres of land and the waterway that handles 14,000 ships a year.
Peter Romero, acting assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere
affairs, told the House panel that the administration had tried for six
years to work out a deal that would allow anti-drug activities to continue.
WASHINGTON - Anti-drug efforts in Latin America have been weakened by the
ending of surveillance flights from a U.S. base in the Canal Zone, the
administration said yesterday. The zone is being transferred to Panama.
State and Defense Department officials said they planned to restore full
operations within two years by building up three smaller staging centers in
the region. However, lawmakers at a House hearing charged the
administration with handling the changeover badly.
"I am deeply alarmed by the administration's disjointed and half-hearted
response to the impending withdrawal of U.S. forces from Panama," said Rep.
Benjamin Gilman, R-Middletown, Orange County, chairman of the House
International Relations Committee.
Howard Air Force Base in the Canal Zone, which ended flights on May 1, was
"the crown jewel in our fight against drugs," Gilman said at a hearing of a
Government Reform subcommittee overseeing drug policy.
Ana Maria Salazar, the Pentagon's deputy assistant secretary for drug
enforcement policy, acknowledged that there would be "a degradation." She
estimated that surveillance coverage of the Caribbean region at the moment
was only half what it was two years ago.
Salazar said the United States had been flying 2,000 counter-drug missions a
year out of Howard, and operations should be up to 85 percent next year as a
result of new interim agreements for use of airfields in Ecuador and the
Dutch islands of Aruba and Curacao. And the government was looking for a
third location that would boost surveillance to 110 percent of the 1997
level by 2001.
The United States turns the canal over to the Panamanian government on Dec.
31, 1999, under the terms of the treaty negotiated by the Carter
administration in 1977. Panama will take over five U.S. military bases,
70,000 acres of land and the waterway that handles 14,000 ships a year.
Peter Romero, acting assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere
affairs, told the House panel that the administration had tried for six
years to work out a deal that would allow anti-drug activities to continue.
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