DRUG PROBE IMPLICATES SALINAS

Swiss prosecutors looking into more than $130 million in suspected
drug deposits in Swiss banks have stumbled into a political minefield
- - claims by their witnesses that former Mexican President Carlos
Salinas de Gortari received drug money.

At least three witnesses have told Swiss prosecutors that their drug
cartels paid off members of the Salinas family, including the former
president, for protecting their activities in Mexico. The claims have
come up in the drug-money-laundering case against Raul Salinas, the
former president's brother.

Mexican officials, defense lawyers and some independent legal experts
question the credibility of the allegations, pointing out that they
were made by convicted criminals who might have concocted the stories
to negotiate lighter sentences or better prison conditions.

Still, U.S. and Mexican law-enforcement agents say that if Swiss
prosecutors provide evidence to corroborate the testimonies, the
allegations would create a political storm in Mexico and seriously
undermine already strained U.S.-Mexican anti-drug efforts.

Switzerland froze more than $130 million in Swiss bank accounts of
Raul Salinas on suspicions of drug money laundering in 1995. Swiss
prosecutors say they will prove the money was tied to drug trafficking
in a trial expected later this year.

Raul Salinas was jailed in 1995 on charges of masterminding the murder
of a leader of Mexico's ruling party. Former President Salinas is
living in self-imposed exile in Ireland and has not been charged.

Among the witnesses who have tied the former president to the drug
trade are Colombian-born Medellin Cartel drug trafficker Jose Manuel
Ramos, Chilean-born Cali Cartel accountant Guillermo Pallomari, and an
unidentified truck driver who testified under the nickname of Erich,
according to documents and law-enforcement officials.

The three were questioned in 1996 and 1997 by Swiss Attorney General
Carla del Ponte and anti-narcotics chief Valentin Roschacher in U.S.
prisons, in the presence of at least three U.S. officials in each
case, according to witnesses.

Ramos told the Swiss prosecutors that he smuggled large quantities of
cocaine from Colombia to Mexico, and from there to the United States,
between 1979 and 1990. He claimed that in the late 1980s he paid large
amounts of money to Raul Salinas for the right to land cocaine-loaded
jets in the northern state of Tamaulipas.

Ramos said that at a meeting at the Galeria Plaza Hotel in Mexico City
in late 1987, Raul Salinas told him that money was needed for his
brother's presidential campaign and that the Salinas family would
offer protection for drug planes to land in exchange for money.

A deal was struck in which the Medellin Cartel would pay Raul Salinas
$300,000 per landing, Ramos said. Over the next few years, he paid
Raul Salinas more than $80 million, he claimed.

Ramos conceded to the Swiss prosecutors that he never talked to Carlos
Salinas, and that all his dealings were with his brother Raul and, on
one occasion, with their father.

Checked-by: "Rich O'Grady"