U.S. VETS LEVEL CHARGES AT MEXICO

MEXICO CITY (AP) - The Mexican army is using U.S. military equipment
intended to stop drug-smuggling to intimidate Indians in southern Mexico, a
group of U.S. veterans charged Friday.

``Our government is supplying arms, equipment and training to the army of
Mexico ... that are being used against the poor people of Mexico,'' said
Wilson Powell, a Korean war veteran and a member of the Veterans for Peace
delegation.

The four-member delegation spent 10 days monitoring military activities in
the southern Mexican states of Oaxaca and Chiapas, where leftist guerrilla
groups have risen up in recent years. They also visited the Chiapas hamlet
of Acteal, where 45 peasants were gunned down by a pro-government
paramilitary group in December.

Veterans for Peace, based in Washington, D.C., plans to present its
findings to church groups and schools in the United States in hopes of
pressuring U.S. officials to monitor the use of its military equipment and
training in Mexico. The group says its purpose is to increase public
awareness of U.S. military involvement in other nations and end the arms
race.

Last year, the State Department pledged $6 million to train narcotics
officers hired after Mexico purged its anti-narcotics program to fight
corruption.

The veterans charge that a lack of monitoring allows the Mexican government
to use such training, as well as military equipment, for purposes beyond
the drug war.

Mexico's government dispatched thousands of troops to the highland region
following a short-lived 1994 rebellion by leftist Zapatista rebels seeking
greater autonomy for Mexico's Indians. The lack of a permanent peace accord
has polarized the zone with some Indian communities siding with the rebels.
Mexico says its maintains troops there to pacify the area and quell
sporadic violence.

During their stay, the veterans saw U.S.-made Huey helicopters flying over
small villages. They heard accusations that the helicopter pilots
intimidated some communities with by flying low over their homes, sometimes
daily.

In recent years, the United States has donated dozens of military planes
and helicopters, including UH-1H Huey choppers, to Mexico to transport
troops assigned to intercept drug shipments.

Mexican soldiers and immigration officials kept a close watch on the group
and repeatedly demanded to see their papers, the veterans said.

``We felt some of the same intimidation the indigenous people who live
there feel,'' Powell said.

Copyright 1998 The Associated Press.