NOTES FROM HERE AND THERE - Lewis Dolinsky

MEXICO STUNG IN MORE WAYS THAN ONE

The Mexican public, opposition parties, even members of the ruling PRI are
mad as hell about the U.S. sting operation against Mexican banks. But
Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, an independent Mexican legislator whose speciality
is relations with North America, says, ``Mexico has permitted, tolerated
and at times cooperated with undercover operations that violate its
sovereignty.'' And will again.

The question in recent days is whether a casual mention in 1996 to the
Mexican attorney general of a pending money-laundering sting constituted
the disclosure (and approval) required under agreements between the two
countries. But Aguilar Zinser, who has spent the year as a visiting scholar
at UC Berkeley, says U.S. agents can get away with practically anything in
Mexico as long as Mexican officials are given 15 minutes warning before
Attorney General Janet Reno and Treasure Secretary Robert Rubin hold a
self-congratulatory press conference.

This time, the Mexicans weren't given that courtesy, and the United States
made it obvious, in public, that it doesn't trust Mexican officials not to
warn the bad guys (or not to be the bad guys). Consequently, Mexican
President Ernesto Zedillo has lashed out at the United States, and Foreign
Secretary Rosario Green has threatened to prosecute U.S. agents. That is
all posturing, says Aguilar Zinser. Mexico could easily retaliate by
expelling U.S. agents. It hasn't, and it won't.

Mexico needs a close relationship with the United States. Besides, it has
no quarrel with U.S. policy -- just with U.S. insensitivity. Aguilar Zinser
says to disregard what Zedillo says in public: The official summary of his
private talk with Clinton shows that he spoke of the possibility of
sovereignty having been violated. That was ``two steps back'' from what his
foreign minister had been saying.

The United States embarrassed Zedillo unnecessarily and at a bad time: He
had authorized a $65 billion bailout for banks, including those indicted,
by buying up bad loans at nearly face value. Until he pays, the government
owes interest. He needs the Mexican Congress to pass a spending bill. Then,
he has to go to U.S. banks and the U.S. Treasury for loans to help banks
that have just been shown to be corrupt as well as incompetent.

How could U.S. officials put a friend in such a lousy position? Aguilar
Zinser thinks we were distracted because it was India-Pakistan week. In
foreign policy, we often have a hard time chewing gum and walking at the
same time. Maybe, we didn't think of a Mexican sting as foreign policy;
maybe we thought of it as domestic policy.

NOTHING SACRED

A newspaper's circulation is down. The publisher wants to attract readers
by providing more fun and games, fewer pages of hard news. The editor may
resist, even resign.

That happened at the Sun, the daily with the largest circulation in London,
only in reverse. Editor Stuart Higgins quit because the bosses decided to
make the Sun more serious, perhaps even junk the topless Page 3 Girl.
Higgins, who left in tears, was described by his comrades as a great
tabloid journalist, even if he didn't have the flamboyance of his
predecessor (who, the Independent says, was known for getting down on all
fours at parties and biting people's ankles).

The drive to go upmarket had already hit the Mirror, the Sun's toughest
competitor. Now the (smaller) Daily Star is reportedly banning tabloid
cliche headline words (raunchy, Page 3 stunner, curvy, madcap, mega and
lesbo).

Something had to give at the Sun; in two years, circulation fell from 4
million to 3.7 million. That's still about twice as high as any American
paper, and five times the circulation of the Times of London.

AN AFRICAN HERO

Fonio, nicknamed ``hungry rice,'' is known to be tasty and nutritious. Like
other traditional African crops (finger millet, pearl millet, teff and
sorghum), it was shunned by colonialists in favor of wheat and corn, which
are more vulnerable to heat and drought and require better soil. But fonio
also has problems: Once it is harvested, a village woman pounds, threshes
and sifts for hours to separate one cup of usable grain from husks, and
four gallons of water are required to produce 4 1/2 pounds (a family-size
meal). Sanoussi Diakite, an engineer from Senegal, came to the rescue. He
invented a relatively inexpensive, energy-efficient machine that, without
water, produces 4 1/2 pounds of ready-to-cook food in six minutes. He
tested prototypes in Senegal, Mali and Guinea and produced 10 more machines
at Lycee Delafosse in Dakar, Senegal's capital, where he teaches. The rural
council in Kolda, southeast Senegal, donated land for a factory. As seed
money, Diakite is using a $50,000 Rolex award for enterprise. His potential
market is 15 African nations where fonio is grown.

His machine is a blow against hunger. He says it's also a blow against
``Afropessimism.''

NICE IDEA

Proud as punch over India's nuclear tests, leaders of the ruling Bharatiya
Janata Party reportedly planned to gather dust from test sites and take it
to Hindu temples. But according to the Indian press, Prime Minister Atal
Bihari Vajpayee stopped them, pointing out that the dust might be
radioactive.

1998 San Francisco Chronicle Page A12

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)